Peace of Mind
by gizmo8us
Summary: Cas struggles with his insanity and tries to find a way to redeem himself as he and Meg escape from the assylum and go on the run from the Angels and Demons that have found them there.
1. Thank You

Thank You -

He was lost, more lost than he had ever been and for him, that was saying something. He felt like he'd spent his entire time on Earth more lost than found, always searching for his place and never quite finding it, always seeking answers to questions that had none.

But now, it was different. He couldn't even manage to form the questions any longer. He had never felt more alone, more isolated, more like he was floundering.

It was like sinking in a hole of quicksand. At first, he fought it with everything inside him. He didn't want to be this way. He'd had no intention of becoming what Sam had been when he took on his burden. He thought he could get the best of the insanity and still be able to manage a more or less normal existence. Once again, his pride had conquered him and there hadn't been anything he could do about it before it was too late. The insanity that Sam had been fighting was more powerful than he'd anticipated and he found it was stronger than him.

He'd never really come up against anything stronger than him before. It was a new experience and one he didn't like at all. Sure he'd made his share of mistakes. He wasn't trying to denying that fact. But always before he'd managed to hold to his sense of righteousness and now even that was gone.

He wasn't righteous. He wasn't a savior. He wasn't even a good person. The things he'd done, he couldn't even begin to come to terms with all that. He was responsible for the evil running rampant in the world. He was to blame for so many deaths, and not just strangers, though that was bad enough, but deaths of those he called friends.

That was the thing he was having the most trouble with. Bobby Singer had been a good man, a righteous man, a man Castiel wished he could be more like. He'd admired him. He'd seen him as something of a role model. He hadn't realized that until he'd heard the news of Bobby's death. But it was true. And there was no mistaking the fact that Castiel was directly responsible for his demise. If he hadn't made the choices he'd made, done the things he'd done, put into motions the things he'd put into motion, Bobby Singer would still be alive, would still be fighting the good fight, would still be a righteous man.

It was the simplest of truths and the thing that made it the hardest to look at himself in the mirror. It had been so long since he'd been able to do that, look in a mirror and recognize the person looking back at him.

He was the worst kind of evil and if the Winchesters really wanted to be humane, they'd drive an Angel's sword through his chest and put him out of his misery. But then, why would they want to be humane to him? He certainly didn't deserve it. He didn't deserve a quick end. He deserved to languish in the self imposed prison of his mind for the rest of eternity.

He'd fucked up. He'd fucked everything up, but then again, that was what he always did. He fucked things up. Everything he'd ever tried to do ended badly.

He remembered, once upon a time, in what felt like a different lifetime, feeling strong, believing in something. But it was all gone now, fallen to the wayside as belief after belief had been ripped away from him until there was nothing left to hold on to.

Nothing but the sound of her voice.

It was the one thing he clung to as insanity waged inside his head. Knowing the things he was seeing weren't really there didn't make them any less real, less painful, less tormenting.

Lucifer was gone now. That had never been his burden to bare. That was Sam's misery, his torture. The things that chased Castiel in his mind were worse. Inky black, toothy things that laughed as they bragged about how easy he had been to manipulate, that was his torment. The things he'd let loose on the world wouldn't stop taunting him, teasing him, playing with him.

Still, underneath it all, was the sound of her voice, talking to him about everything and nothing, soothing him with her low, dulcet tones.

Even better were the times when he could feel her hands on him, anchoring him to a reality he no longer felt part of. Her fingertips brushed his damp forehead in the dead of the night and it was something to grab hold of. Her touch was never what he'd expect from her.

A demon, and not just any demon, but one capable of inflicting unspeakable pain on a soul so sever it would never recover, somehow managed to touch him with a tenderness that took his breath away. Her gentle hands pushed back the hair that became plastered to his forehead with the sweat of his fear. Her soft voice lulled him into a place where he could find enough peace to sleep for a while. Her reassuring presence made that sleep a peaceful one.

He could tell the difference. Even if he couldn't find the reserves of strength to let her know it, he knew when she was there and when she wasn't. When she was gone the dreams were anything but peaceful. The few hours she spent out of his presence were more painful than he could bare and the relief he felt the moment she stepped into his bland, gray walled world was monumental. His life had come down to that, actually, moments of unendurable torture between times when she was with him. He braced himself when she left, holding on to the thought in his mind that he just had to make it through until she returned.

He held to her, though he was sure she didn't know it. She saved him, though he couldn't make her see it. He'd come to depend on her to get him through the worst of his visions, his torture. He pulled on her strength, her confidence, her self assurance.

What he couldn't understand was why. Why did her presence stave off the agony in his brain? Why was it her he drew from like he did?

It didn't make sense. He hated her, hated everything she stood for, if she still indeed stood for anything. But then again, she was a lot like him, lost and floundering with no direction and nothing to believe in anymore.

She was the enemy or she had always been before. Now he wasn't sure how to categorize her anymore. Surely an enemy wouldn't still be here, day after day, night after night, offering what little comfort she could. That wasn't how enemies acted towards each other. Why wasn't she jumping on the opportunity of his weakness to make him pay for all the things he'd done to her? Why wasn't she adding to his torture instead of easing it?

That was what he would have expected from her. Not this. Never this. It was confusing, the way her thumb caressed the back of his hand when she held it as she read to him in the wee hours of the night while everyone around them slept. He couldn't explain the desperation in her voice when she finally put the book away and almost pleaded with him to come back to her. But it happened every night and he was more than certain that she had no idea he could hear her. If she did she'd never let him see the tears that streamed down her cheeks or the look in her eyes as she gazed at him helplessly.

What he found in her was compassion and he had no idea what he'd done to deserve that from her. She wanted to help him. She was intense in her need to save him. She offered him her pity, her sympathy and more than that, the diligence of her determination to help him live through all this.

And he was sure he'd have already given up if it hadn't been for her. But she never left him. She always came right back, over and over. He had no idea how she managed to talk the staff into letting her do what she was doing, but he was grateful for it. She was with him nearly twenty-four hours a day. She took the burden of his care on completely alone. No other nurse came around to tend to him. No one else even came near him unless she approved. She fed him, dressed him, bathed him. He was completely at her mercy and in the beginning that had terrified him. But it was a notion quickly put aside when he found her to be almost loving in her care for him.

Now he trusted her like he'd never trusted anyone before, not even Sam or Dean. His life, his survival was in her hands and she had proved to him that they were able, capable hands and he had nothing to worry about, at least, on that front and that was a relief in itself. Knowing she was there, taking care of what was happening on the outside left him more reserve to fight the battles waging on the inside.

He hoped she understood that. He hoped that somehow she knew how important she had become to him. He made a promise to himself to tell her as soon as he was able.

It was something she needed to hear. Because whether she knew it or not, he heard everything she said to him. He knew it all, at least on some level. He knew her now. He recognized the sadness in her voice when she told him about her life when she'd been a mere human caught up in a life that had gotten out of control faster than she'd been able to stop it. He knew about the man that had turned her into the thing she'd become. He knew how much she hated herself for letting that happen.

He was surprised to hear that she hadn't always been what she was now. Once, she'd been a fresh-faced young girl, full of all the hopes and dreams that young girls held to so desperately, love, children, a family, happiness. She'd wanted all that once, wanted it so badly she'd let herself do things she'd never forgive herself for. That made sense to him. He knew all about things that couldn't be forgiven.

He wondered, at times when his tormentors were at rest, what she had been like when she was human. He thought that perhaps the gentle, tender, loving woman he found himself with now was as close to the real her as anyone had ever seen. And he knew that allowing him to see that side of her was a gift, a precious gift that he would always treasure. He also knew that if she even suspected he could see her like that through the haze of his craziness, she'd be gone.

She'd never be able to see herself like he saw her. Gentle and tender in her eyes was weak and vulnerable, two things she'd never let herself be again. Her time in hell had made her strong, resilient and resourceful. She couldn't afford to let anyone know that it was all just a mask. The snarky humor, the devil-may-care attitude, the fuck-them-all demeanor were her way of keeping herself safe. And he'd never take those away from her.

She needed to stay hidden. It was the only way she could survive. Without them, the world around her would eat her alive, chew her up and spit her out. Without them, she'd be exactly where he was now.

She'd seen and done things that no one could ever come back from in tact. She'd been Crowley's right hand, his apprentice of sorts, before Dean came along and usurped her. Crowley had taken an already twisted, vulnerable mind and turned it into a machine to do his bidding. And do his bidding she had, until he found he longer had a use for her. Then he'd cast her aside, just like every other man in her life had ever done to her, starting with a human father that was little better than the demonic one that had adopted her.

She'd been hurt so many times, abused and abandoned over and over by those she thought genuinely cared about her.

First, her human father. Castiel suspected there was far more to that story than she was letting on. The cold edge in her voice when she mentioned him spoke volumes of the things he'd put the poor girl through long before she'd ever been touched by the evil that claimed her. She'd admitted that locking her in the basement of her family's home to fend for herself against the rats and other vermin that inhabited the dark, dank place had been something of a pastime for him. That was, of course, when he was done beating her for even the smallest indiscretion. But there was something more, something darker and much more sinister in what she left unspoken that made it possible for him to focus on her pain for a moment and put his own aside.

Her road to darkness had started with a slave on the plantation where she grew up. The woman had apparently taken an interest in the young Meg and began to teach her the magic of her people. Voodoo was the proper term for it and not just harmless voodoo, but the darkest, bloodiest kind. The kind that turned people into puppets and took away their free will.

That was the instrument the human Meg had used to procure herself a husband and an escape from her father. It had been an act of desperation, but it was also an act that condemned her soul. She had died at his hands when he learned what she had done to him. She hadn't gone into the details of how he'd found out, only that he had and he killed her for it.

But the damaged had already been done and Crowley had wasted no time in claiming her as his own. She had been a gifted practitioner as a human. She hadn't disappointed as a demon. Castiel could understand why. Meg was loyal beyond anything else and so very eager for approval she was an easy mark for those that knew the art of manipulation. And Crowley was, of course, a master in the field.

Once that had gone south, once Crowley had cast her aside for the shinier, prettier toy he'd found in Dean, she'd thrown herself in the only direction left open to her.

And it made sense as well. She had more father issues than any sane person could handle, so naturally she'd latched onto the closest thing to that she could find.

Looking back, Cas could admit that he regretted that it had been him that informed her that Lucifer wasn't the father she'd been seeking for so long. He didn't like knowing that he'd caused her pain when he delivered that news. At the time, he'd reveled in the look of shock and disbelief on her beautiful face. He'd watched as her dark eyes flashed at him in rage and even though he was, for all intents and purposes, her prisoner at the time, the sight of her like that had done things to him, caused his body to stir in ways he wasn't familiar with.

Recalling that time reminded him of the scars she surely still carried from the fire he'd thrown her into to aid his escape. He remembered not even thinking twice before he'd stepped into the middle of her back and made his escape using her as a bridge. He regretted that now, too and he was grateful that the scars were hidden under the blue cotton scrubs she always wore. He didn't want to be reminded of them every time he looked at her. He already had so much to feel guilty for.

Knowing he had caused her that kind of pain and she'd answered it with the kind of kindness she was giving him now was more than he wanted to think about. It was more than he could handle.

She was sitting in a chair beside his bed now, reading to him like she did every night. He was never very sure what she was reading. Sometimes, he thought he recognized a passage or two here and there, but normally, like tonight, it was her voice alone that calmed him. The words mattered very little.

He narrowed his eyes to the barest of slits and focused all his concentration on her for a moment. The effort was straining but more than worth it. Her feet were propped on the bed resting against his thigh. In one hand she held the book. The other hand was absently playing with the few dark, curly tendrils of hair that had escaped from the bun at the back of her head. Blood red nail polish on her perfectly manicured fingertip peaked through the darkness of her hair startling him with its contrast. She pulled her pouty, pale pink, bottom lip between her teeth as she paused and reached for the glass of water on the table beside his bed.

He studied her intently as she pressed the glass to her lips and took a long, slow drink from it's contents and he was suddenly lost in the memory of the feel of those lips against his own. He could remember exactly the way she tasted, Earthy, rich and so very full of life. Even in the heart of battle with Hell hounds breathing down their necks and danger around every corner, it had taken everything inside him to let her go. He hadn't expected to feel that.

The kiss was an experiment of sorts and one she'd initiated. She used sex like a weapon wielded skillfully as a means to getting what she wanted and in that instance it had been his sword that caught her fancy. She'd kissed him to distract him so she could snatch it from his side. But there was something more there.

It hadn't been necessary for starters. She could have easily gotten her hands on the sword without the subterfuge of the kiss. She was quick and nimble and he was already more than a little distracted by the dangers assailing them. It wouldn't have even been much of a challenge for her to just grab the damn thing away from him.

But instead she'd kissed him and it was a smart move. It had served not only to distract him while she slide her petite hand around his side and seized the weapon. Sam and Dean had been more than a little dumbstruck by the move as well. And they were even more stupefied when Castiel had decided that he would never get a better chance to test the waters of his own sexuality.

It was bad timing, he admitted that, but the first kiss had felt so good, he had to know what all the fuss was about. And once he had her braced against the wall with his body pressing insistently into hers, her hands threaded in his hair and her lips moving pliantly under his own, he understood it all. He hadn't at the time. He'd simply filed the emotions away to examine at a better, later time.

But once he had that better time, he understood all the fuss completely. In fact, her mouth had become something of a distraction for him for a long time. Just being in the same room with her threw him off his game more than a little.

She put the book aside and laid it on the table beside her water. She was watching him watching her so intently with a perplexed look on her sharply chiseled features. Dark eyelashes blinked at him surrounding even darker eyes that saw more than any mere human ever would.

She leaned in close to him after dropping her feet to the floor with a thump. "What are you thinking about so hard, Feathers? What is that look all about?"

The nicknames had confused him at first, then they irritated him once Dean had explained their meaning. Now he wanted to smile at the familiarity of them. He liked them, Feathers, Clarence, Tree-topper, all her little names that were originally meant in mocking. Somehow since she'd come to look after him, the mocking was gone and there was genuine warmth and affection when she spoke them.

For some reason the voices in his mind seemed less loud tonight and he thought maybe, just maybe he might be able to get a message out to her. He wanted to try at least. There might not be a better time to make the attempt.

He wet his lips, swallowed hard, and tried to sit up. He only managed to lift his head from the pillow and already he could feel the fog working to pull him back under, but he wasn't done yet. Even if all he managed was one sentence, at least she would know that he was still there, that her efforts weren't for nothing.

"Thank you," he breathed out between gritted teeth.

Her eyes widened in shock for a moment then turned compassionate. She reached for his hand and gave it a squeeze. "You're welcome, Clarence. I promise I'm not going anywhere. You're safe as long as I have any say in the matter."

The vow she made meant more to him than he could possibly tell her. He believed her, trusted her and with the promise still in the air between them, he dropped his head back to his pillow and closed his eyes. He let himself drift off as he indulged in the small amount of peace she offered him.


	2. Fallen Demon

Fallen Demon

She didn't know how to help him and that reality dug into her soul and tugged at the ragged pieces still left there. She didn't even know why that was. She shouldn't care this much. She couldn't afford to.

But she did care and there was no getting around that fact. She cared about him, maybe more than that, but cared was as far as she was willing to admit for now. She wasn't even sure she was capable of more than that anymore.

She doubted he knew she was there. He gave no outward sign that he even acknowledged her presence, rather less wanted it. And why would he want her around? She was his enemy. That's the way it had always been and if Sam and Dean's attitude were any indication of his, she would never be more than that.

Angel and Demon, two sides of a battle that had been waging since the dawn of man. But then again, neither of them were truly what they'd started out as anymore. He was no more Angel than she was Demon now. She'd been a first hand witness to his fall, maybe not the culmination of it, but she'd been there when his wings began to droop. She'd seen the signs of his fall long before he'd hit the ground.

And her? Was it possible for a Demon to fall from grace as the Angels could? Because there was really no other explanation for where she found herself now. A fallen Demon searching for her place in the world and just trying to survive. Surviving was what she did. And if switching teams was the only way for her to accomplish that task, then switch teams she would. And she'd do it with everything inside her, because Meg Masters never, ever did anything halfway.

Her loyalties weren't something that could be divided. Once she was committed to something she stayed that way until the bitter end. The problem was there was no longer anything for her to commit herself to and that left her troubled, confused and not knowing where to turn.

Then she'd heard about Castiel's reappearance in the world and suddenly her purpose became clear. She needed him. As long as Crowley was running things down below, she had a bull's eye on her chest. She'd spent so much time hiding, laying low, running for her life. She knew she couldn't keep it up. Although, to be honest, she wasn't sure that hitching her wagon to Crowley's most wanted was the best way for her to lay low. But it was her only option for the time being.

Getting rid of Crowley was the only way she'd ever manage to live the nice long life she wanted to live. Going back to hell to languish wasn't on her agenda. She had no intention of giving up the fight, though there were times when she was exhausted, friend-less and more than a little scared that the idea had some appeal.

In fact, that is exactly where she was when she'd heard the first stirrings of rumors about the Angel's survival.

She'd decided to take her chances with the Winchesters. Maybe if she could manage to avoid them killing her on sight, she could make them see how useful she could be. The brothers were nothing if not practical. And Dean had saved her life once, why she could never make herself understand, but he had and it was something to go on. It wasn't much, but it wasn't nothing.

And when this opportunity had presented itself to her, there was no way she could pass it up. Not only could she endear herself to the Winchesters, but she could get the troubled Angel on her side as well. And that was a lot more than nothing.

These were good people, people that believed in returning favors. These people understood the way it worked and they held up their end. They could be trusted which was more than she could say for the demons she normally mingled with. There was a sense of obligation here. And she was doing everything she could to make them feel obligated to her.

At least that was how it started out. This was all supposed to be just a means to an end for her. Take care of the crazy angel and Sam and Dean and even Castiel himself would owe her one.

Now it was more than that. She wouldn't admit it out loud, but Castiel had come to mean something to her.

Maybe it was just some sort of warped, reversed Florence Nightingale syndrome. Maybe his desperate need for her had turned into something else in her mind and she was making things up in her imagination that couldn't possibly be true. But she wanted to believe that it mattered to him that she was there. And the motive for that wasn't about owing her a favor.

Somehow it wasn't about her at all anymore. It was about him, about easing his pain, helping him through his suffering. She wanted, no, needed to feel like she was doing something for him. She wanted him to need her, not because she wanted something from him, though she still did want something from him, but the real motive was more about her need to feel needed. Actually it was about more than that even. She'd done things to souls, souls that had, at one time, been clean and untainted, just like hers had once been. So she knew the things that were going on inside the Angel's head. She'd been responsible for inflicting the same sort of pain on countless many. But just maybe by helping him, she could make up for some of that. She didn't know why that was important to her, but it was. She needed to make amends for the evils she'd caused, wanted to grab hold of some kind of redemption for her acts.

And that was strange too. Demons didn't feel guilty for what they did. They weren't supposed to hate themselves for following the orders handed down to them. But she did. Perhaps that meant she wasn't cut out for the work. She could live with that. It wasn't great work and there were no openings for her at the moment anyway.

She'd been searching for a cause since Lucifer had abandoned her and now she had one. She'd keep Castiel safe. He was her cause now, her purpose.

What she couldn't so easily explain was her need to be nice to him. She didn't have to. It wasn't part of the bargain. Her promise to the Winchesters had been to keep him alive not make him comfortable. Watching over him didn't entail trying to help him fight his way through the torture in his mind.

She reasoned that the only way he could truly help her was if he were sane. She told herself that was why she held his hand in the middle of the night and sat beside him while the worst of his nightmares caused him to thrash and cast about in his sleep.

Those nightmares had convinced her that she wasn't just wasting her time here. If it hadn't been for the fact that he seemed to settle when she took hold of his hand and talked to him, she would have thought herself useless.

But there was progress being made. She knew that now.

When she first came to him, she found him spending his days staring at nothing and talking to himself. His nights were worse as the nightmares ran unchecked through his consciousness. She'd never felt more helpless. Nothing she did seemed to get through to him.  
Then one day, out of the blue, he'd turned to her and there was recognition in the depths of those tumultuous blue orbs that reminded her of the sea in the midst of a hurricane. The fog was still there, masking their normal brightness, but she could see him there as well. And when he opened his mouth and her name fell from his lips, her heart soared in a way she hadn't expected it to.

That was the moment she devoted herself to helping him win the war over his sanity. She'd help him find his way back to himself. And maybe in doing that, she might find herself as well. Now this was as much about her own need for redemption as it was about helping him become whole so he could seek his own.

So she spent every day taking care of his needs. He didn't need to eat which was a good thing because forcing him to do so was probably beyond her capabilities. There were times, when the madness had full control of him, that he fought her as she tried to see to his needs and it was a battle to see which of them would win. Still she made the effort to pretend. She couldn't afford to have the staff of the hospital questioning things like that about him.

She was thankful for the poor wiring in the old building. It helped explain the way all the lights on the floor where his room was located spontaneously blew out all at once on occasion. It didn't happen often, but every once in a while, Castiel had his fill of the insanity and fought back against it in a spectacular show that proved he was still in there somewhere and he still had plenty of Angel juice at his disposal.

The first time it happened, it frightened her. She just knew he was about to come out of his stupor, see her and gank her without thinking twice about it. But his attacks were never directed at her. There had been one time, in fact, when he grabbed her and pushed her behind him as he fought off something only he could see. He had protected her and she didn't know why. But she was grateful for his unexplainable safeguarding of her. If he felt the need to be her hero, she certainly wasn't going to argue with him.

Her nights were spent by his side, reading to him from books, magazines, anything she could get her hands on really. It seemed to comfort him, the sound of her voice, so she talked, never really sure if he knew what she was saying but content in the fact that the sound of her voice appeared to help.

She told him of things she'd never spoken aloud to anyone, things about her life as a human, things about her time in Hell with Crowley, things about the years she'd been on her own and running for her life.

At times, she could swear she saw him looking back at her. But by the time she latched on to the thought the vacancy was back in his eyes and he was no longer there. He was too elusive for her. It was like trying to grasp hold of a spider web in a windstorm. The line was too flimsy for her to grab. She thought that maybe, just maybe if she _could_ grab hold of that fleeting recognition for even just a moment, she might be able to break through to him.

So she tried, almost every night, she tried. She pleaded and begged him to give her something, anything she could use to help him. And every night it was as fruitless as the night before. She would have suspected he'd given up and vacated the useless, wasted vessel he found himself trapped in if it weren't for those so very rare instances when he reached out to her.

Instances like the one she just witnessed. It had been a simple statement, so quiet if she hadn't been staring right at him, she might have missed it. But she had been and he'd told her with two words, eight silly little letters, that he knew she was there and appreciated all the effort she was making.

"Thank you," he'd said and it meant more to her than she could tell him.

She'd been so stunned by his moment of lucidity that she wasn't sure what to say in response. He was seeing her for the first time in days. His eyes, though more hooded than normal, were clear. The effort he was exerting to reach out to her was apparent on his face, but he was making the effort and that was something.

He was still in there, still fighting the fight.

She was disappointed when he dropped his head back to the pillow and his rhythmic breathing told her he was asleep. She had hoped that perhaps they might make even more progress before he gave up, but she also understood what even that little touch of sanity had cost him and she didn't disturb him.

Especially when she saw that he was actually sleeping peacefully for the first time in forever. She couldn't deny him that. She couldn't take that away from him.

The exhaustion he felt was evident on his handsome face. His eyes bore the marks of heavy dark circles underneath them. His skin had taken on an ashen pallor and there was a perpetual crease between his brows. He needed the rest if he were to continuing battling the madness and she'd let him have it. In fact, she'd make sure that got as much as he needed.

Getting to her feet, she moved the uncomfortable, torture devise the hospital called a chair away from his bed and pulled it quietly to the door. Then she propped it under the knob, effectively locking out the rest of the world.

She'd have some explaining to do as to why the door had been locked, but it was nothing she couldn't handle. She'd make the humans understand that it was in her patient's best interest one way or another. Once the door was secure, she looked around the empty room and considered her options. She could take one of the spare blankets from the bed and makes herself a pallet on the floor. That was probably the most appropriate course of action.

But as she reached for the blanket that was folded across the foot of the bed, the little Tree-Topper pitched in his sleep and reached out in the direction of where she'd been sitting only moments before. It was like he was reading her mind and telling her he didn't approve of her decision.

At least that's what she told herself as she eased herself down to the bed beside him. She was doing this for him. She wanted to give him a peaceful night of rest.

It wasn't until much later that she realized that his presence quieted the nightmares in her mind as much as she quieted them for him.

She'd never told anyone about the nightmares. They rarely bothered her anyway. She was a demon. She didn't need to sleep anymore than she needed to eat. That didn't mean that she didn't find herself nodding off on occasion. And it was on those occasions that the nightmares came. The last time she'd slept without being haunted by her past, she'd been human with no past to haunt her.

Castiel shifted behind her and she was more than a little startled when his arm slid around her waist and he tucked his head into the crook of her shoulder. It wasn't the move that startled her. She had been half expecting it since she laid down next to him. It was how much she liked the feel of him wrapped around her that surprised her. Or maybe, more than that, it was the feeling of being protected.

She knew he was next to useless in his present state, but that didn't stop her mind from imagining that this was what feeling safe must feel like.


	3. They're Coming

They're coming -

She woke as the first hazy strains of dawn began to whisper across the gray concrete floor. She wasn't exactly sure where she was at first. Then she shifted and suddenly she remembered all too well where she was and who's arm was across her waist. She tensed which only served to cause the arm to tighten and pull her further back into the solid comfort of his chest. Her first instinct was to struggle. She didn't really do touching. It wasn't something she was comfortable with, not like this anyway.

This was too close, too intimate and she was certain she didn't like it. Sex was one thing, but this was something different all together. It was weird and creepy and the fact that she could almost say she was enjoying it made her skin crawl.

Without giving it another thought, she eased his arm off of her and got out of the bed. He shifted behind her but didn't wake and she was glad for that. She wasn't ready to deal with him yet. She needed a moment for herself. She took very few. He occupied nearly all of her time.

It was all very self-less of her. She almost laughed out loud at the thought of those two words in the same sentence, her and self-less. She had never been what anyone might describe as self-less, at least she'd never thought so. Truth be told, she'd always seen herself as quite the opposite. Maybe she was growing. It could happen. It wasn't out of the realm of possibilities.

Or maybe when it came right down to it, her motives for being self-less were entirely selfish. She needed him to get rid of Crowley and crazy took a lot of time to deal with.

See? All very selfish after all. She was glad she was able to reason it out in her head. The only other possibility for all this was that she really cared about the man behind her. And that was so utterly ridiculous it didn't deserve any more thought.

The morning flew by quickly with very little interference from the outside world. Most of their days were like that. People left them alone. She did her best to see that they continued to do so. The less people in direct contact with the angel the better.

He was having a good week, by most standards. He hadn't freaked out in a number of days. He hadn't really done much of anything in days. And she had to count that as some sort of progress. At least he didn't seem to be struggling like he had at first. That was comforting. It said he was learning to deal with all the noise in his head. Either that, or he was sinking even further inside himself and she was losing him. Something about that thought made her gut clench, so she pushed it away and pretended it wasn't there.

She had no idea how to define the emotions she was dealing with lately. She had no bases of comparison. She hadn't felt fondly towards anyone in so very long. It was hard to grasp the concept. In all honesty, she hadn't felt anything in longer than she could remember.

Once she became the thing she'd become, she turned all that off, pushed away all the feelings that she had no idea how to deal with. It was just too much, too huge to consider. The pain she'd caused, the things she'd done, she never would have been able to handle all that if she hadn't turned off it all off.

Now she was numb. There wasn't anything left inside her to feel anything. She'd managed to shut it all away in a neat little box that she never intended to open. Pandora had nothing on what was locked away inside Meg's box.

That was why every time she felt those tingling feelings in the pit of her stomach while she watched him sleep, every time her heart skipped a beat when it seemed that he was really seeing her, every time she felt the need to comfort him through his worst episodes, she pushed it away. She was afraid if she let herself actually feel anything for the broken man, it might bust that box open and she was pretty certain that if that happened it would destroy her.

She pushed the good feelings away with the bad. Better to feel nothing at all than to have to feel everything. That was the price she paid for the things she'd done.

She pretended to help him eat his breakfast, ate it herself and sent the empty tray away. Then she started the exercise she'd started when she first came to look after him. It wasn't helping, but she figured, at least, she was doing something.  
She brought the chair over to the side of the bed where he was sitting and placed it directly in front of him. Then she sat and took his hands in hers.

"How are we doing today, Clarence? Is there anybody in there?" she asked, leaning forward and placing herself directly in his vision.

Some days, it worked and those days sent a thrill of triumph through her that she had to work hard to suppress. Other days nothing happened and she felt deep disappoint that she hadn't been able to reach him.

Today, it took long enough that she was just about to give up when he finally squeezed her hands halfheartedly.

"I was just about to give up on you. But we're going to have a good day today, right? We're going to do it just like we practiced, remember?"

He gave her another squeeze and she returned it with a warm, reassuring smile. "Okay, now concentrate on my voice. You can do this. Forget all the other crap rolling around in there and just listen to me."

She watched him carefully, seeing if her 'therapy' was having any affect at all.

For a moment, a fleeting, blinking second in time, she thought she saw something cross through his eyes. A recognition and an echo of the man he used to be, but it was gone quickly and soon enough the mask was back.

So she tried again. "Castiel, I know you can hear me. You can't just hide in there like this. We need you out here with us." She hated going where she was about to go. It always upset him when she brought it up. "I don't mean to point fingers, or anything, but you've left a helluva mess out here. We need you to help us clean it up."

His hands twitched in hers and he tried to pull away, but she held tight and continued on. "Those Winchester boys certainly can't do this without you. They can't tie their own shoes without help." Another fruitless twitch in response.

"Come on, Clarence. I need your help, too." This time instead of trying to get away, he squeezed her hands. "I'm just so tired of running. I need you to help me so I can stop running."

He was watching her now, closely examining her with eyes that looked clear. They raked over her face slowly like he was taking inventory of it, studying her.

She looked away, not liking the intensity of his gaze, then felt like a fool for doing it. This was what she wanted, to connect to him. Now, here he was reaching out and she was pulling away. Before she had a chance to bring her eyes back to his, she jumped as his hand came up to cup the side of her face.

Her eyes shot to his as hope surged through her. But the hand fell away, landing with a resounding thump on his thigh.

He was gone again. She knew the signs. There would be no more progress for now. The exhaustion was clear on his face. He had fought as hard as he could, for as long as he could.

"Damn it, Cas. Why can't you give me a break?" she muttered under her breath and got to her feet.

She didn't know what it was, but something was suddenly making her impatient and cranky. Not that that was unusual for her, but it wasn't normally directed towards him. Usually she managed to keep all that in check around him. Normally, he didn't inspire those feelings in her.

But there was something pulling on her today. Something she couldn't explained. She just hoped her mood wasn't a harbinger of things to come.

She would never admit it out loud, but there was something of a romantic hiding deep inside her. She couldn't let that kind of information get out. Those were the things about herself that were better hidden away. Not meant for public consumption. But it was there all the same and it was that part of her that stood at the window in the tiny room and watched as the afternoon sun struggled to peak through an array of clouds that were doing their best to block the attempt. It broke through in several places, casting its rays through the army of clouds. The clouds were moving quickly enough to easily catch with her eye and it seemed as if they were rallying around the beams, plugging the holes in it's defense.

It was fitting somehow, the scene in front of her, indicative of the scene silently playing out behind her. He was the Sun, doing everything in his power to peak out through the heavy cloud cover of his madness. It was a daunting thought that left her feeling more than a little melancholy. She didn't like thinking about him on those terms. She preferred to imagine him strong enough to break through any barrier set in his path. That was how she'd always seen him.

Since the first time she'd met Castiel, standing behind Sam and Dean in his rumpled tan trench coat with his normal, perpetual confession at the world around him, he'd still managed to seem strong to her.

She remembered how incredibly strong his hands felt as they grasped her arms in the moments before he threw her to the ground and used her to escape the trap of Holy Fire holding him hostage. She remembered how strong his body felt as he pressed against her in Crowley's lair moments before his lips seized hers in a kiss that still caused things in her body to tighten just from the memory of it.

The kiss played itself over in her mind quite often since she'd found herself playing nursemaid to him. There was so much potential there, potential for an unbridled passion she'd never have imagined coming from a being that was supposed to be so pious and righteous. It was something she'd spent many hours contemplating. How could this Angel, of all things, possess the kind of fiery intensity she'd witnessed in those moments? She'd only seen that kind of hunger in those of her own kind. She'd never expected it of him.

And seeing him in his present state only added to her confusion at the situation. Maybe there was a part of himself he was hiding from the world at large just like she did. It amazed her sometimes how much alike they were.

Both so very lost in a world that held no place for them. They were both soldiers, set on opposites ends of the field, but soldiers all the same. They both knew what it meant to follow orders. But they were both also leaders and they both knew how to give orders when they had to. He'd been the strong one when it came time to question those orders. He was the one with principals, ethics and a sense of right and wrong. She'd never gone against the grain like he had. She'd never had that kind of courage.

She let out a deep, audible sigh as a splattering of heavy, fat raindrops hit the window and the Sun lost it's battle from dominance. The last of its beams disappeared as the clouds finally pulled in enough reinforcements to send it packing, giving it no choice but to give up the fight. A roll of thunder off in the distance was followed quickly by a flash of lightning and she braced herself.

Castiel didn't like storms. He didn't like anything that didn't follow the status quo.

She didn't like the rain either. It was depressing. But thunderstorms, on the other hand, that was a different story. There was something so violent and unhinged in the air when the skies shouted out with such conviction and unmistakable fury. It was a testament to just how destructive one of the human's 'Gods' could really be. They bragged on and on about the goodness of the Gods they choose to worship. Yet here, right in front of her was the evidence to the contrary.

Not one among the humans could claim that Mother Nature wasn't one of the good and righteous of their nature Spirits. She routinely unleashed the power of her violence down on Her people, smiting them indiscriminately through hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, flood and fires. The humans never really bothered to connect those dots. They never thought about the thing in those particular terms. And what really astounded Meg, was that not one among them seemed to see that Her wrath was getting stronger as the humans continued on their path to destroy Her. Meg never been what one might call a tree-hugger, but even she could see the disadvantages to pissing something as power as Mother Nature off.

"Meg?" her name caused her to spin around towards Castiel and what she found startled her.

He was sitting up on the side of the bed and how she hadn't heard him move was beyond her because when she turned away from him, he'd been laying down. His eyes, clear and sober and so very, very blue, scanned her face as the furrow between his brows deepened in confusion.

"Well, look who decided to join the land of the living," she said, taking a step towards him and offering him a warm smile.

He tried to smile back but it fell away long before it came to full fruition. "I need to..." his voice trailed off and he seemed lost once again, but there was still something of him in his eyes that remained glued to her.

She came quickly to his side, kneeling and taking his hands in hers. "You need to what, Feathers? Come on, you can tell me. Just give me some kind of clue."

His face tensed and he closed his eyes and shook his head. "I..." he muttered. "They're so loud!"

Then his hands suddenly came around her biceps and he pulled her in close. There was a look of agony on his face now, an unspeakable pain as he struggled for enough clarity to get his message out. His fingers dug into her skin, leaving bruising marks in their wake as he fought desperately. "They're here." He finally managed in a twisted, unfamiliar voice that sent a chill straight up her spine.


	4. The Getaway

The getaway

Fear settled in the pit of her stomach as she searched his face which had now grown slack as he lost his battle just as the sun had.

She pushed down the panic that almost seized her. She couldn't let that happen. Besides, she'd always known this was a possibility. It wasn't like she hadn't made contingency plans. All she had to do was get Castiel to give her just a tiny bit of help. She'd hoped that if this ever did happen it would be because he won the battle with the madness. She didn't relish the idea of having to tote a half catatonic angel to the safe place she had set up, but she couldn't see any other choice.

Grabbing his wrist, she yanked him along as she headed for the door. She paused at the doorway and gave both ends a glance. It didn't take more than that for her to realize exactly how precarious their situation was. Angels, two of them with their goody-toe smirks and snappy suits were talking to a member of the staff at one end of the hall. Two demons, looking every bit like a couple of strung out junkies, were stalking towards them from the other end.

She was caught. No, they were caught. There wouldn't even be a point of her running if she wasn't dragging Castiel with her. Better to just let them have her now if she didn't keep him safe. It would be the end of her. Cas was her last chance at salvation. Her only hope. Getting him out was imperative.

She tightened her grip on the wrist attached to the man who was currently pressed against her as he mimicked her move of sneaking a peak down the hall. His expression was almost comical in its inappropriateness. His eyes were dreamy as he stared straight at the danger surrounding them and yet didn't see it at all. He showed no reaction whatsoever to the approaching forcing.

"You really ought to work on your early response time. In situations like this, seconds count, Cloud-hopper." she muttered over her shoulder at him.

"I told you about it as soon as I knew it was happening," he informed her in a perfectly reasonable, voice.

She chanced a glance towards him and found him staring back at her with clear eyes and a grim expression. "You know what's going on?" she demanded as relief surged through her.

"I think I understand the gist of the situation. We're surrounded with no where to run. So we're pretty much screwed. Does that about sum it up?" he answered.

"Yeah, that about does it," she nodded at him numbly. "I have a bag stored in the storage room at the end of the cross hall by the exit. We just need a distraction to get past them. If they see us dart out like that, they'll both be on us before we can blink."

"We could just wait for them, then stand back and let them fight it out," he suggested. "Maybe they'll destroy each other instead of us."

She rolled her eyes. "Of course you'd say that. You're on the side that will most likely win," she admitted.

"Okay, what about that fire alarm? It says to pull it in case of an emergency. This seems like an emergency to me," he suggested.

She spotted the alarm on the wall directly across from his room. "Clarence, I could kiss you," she smirked over her shoulder at him.

"Why would you do that?" he asked a moment before she darted out of the room and yanked the alarm down quickly.

The bells sounded out immediately and with them brought the entire hospital staff as they all set about working through the routine they'd learned through disaster drills. The hall filled quickly with patients and employees alike.

She turned back towards the room to wave Cas on to join her, but the doorway was empty and there was no sign of her charge. Darting back across the hall, she shoved her way inside and found him huddled in the corner of the room with his hands over his ears.

"It didn't occur to you that the alarm was going to be loud," she mumbled as she took his hand in hers and urged him to straighten up.

He didn't answer her. She didn't expect him to. He was back in his own mind again and she didn't have time to reach out to him now.

He followed along behind her with shuffling, zombie-like steps as she ducked around patients and slipped past staff members. At the storage closet, she shoved him inside and darted in behind him. She rested his back against the wall and prayed that he wouldn't try to run on her while she retrieved the bag.

"Stay!" she demanded with a finger pointed in his face.

He didn't respond and she had no idea whether he heard her or not. She doubted it since his hands were once again covering his ears and he was making a painful, groaning noise deep in his throat.

She hesitated for a second before turning her back on him and going to the far corner to get the bag. Once she had it in hand, she turned back and found him just as she'd left him.

Snatching his hand in hers again, she maneuvered him out the door and started to turn him towards the exit a few steps away.

But he stopped in mid turn and began to struggle against her. She glanced up to see what the problem was and found that the two angels had found them and were now standing at the entrance to the hall.

She eyed them warily as she placed herself between them and Cas and started to back them both towards the door.

She hadn't wanted this to happen. She didn't want the Angels to know he was still alive any more than she wanted to demons to have that knowledge. Either way it played out badly for her and Castiel.

The angels were moving towards them, ignoring the chaos still happening all around them and making a bee-line for their target. They had found what they came for and they were zeroing in on their prey.

She smacked into Cas and realized they were at the end of the hall. All she needed to do was push against the bar on the door and they would be free.

Just as she was about to circle around him, the angels were suddenly right in front of them.

"Castiel!" one of them called and suddenly Cas turned a sober face towards them.

His hands were resting on Meg's waist, holding her against him protectively. "Laoth, Sorush," Castiel said with a smile like he was addressing two old friends he hadn't seen in awhile. "It's been too long."

One of the angels took a step towards them and Meg tensed.

"It's okay," Castiel told her. "These are friends of mine. Laoth was given the task of smiting all the demons on Earth. A lofty task to be sure. But he's very good at his job."

"That's nice to hear," she spat towards him. "But in case it escaped your attention, I AM one of the demons on Earth."

"Yes, you are," the Angel agreed with a predatory look at her.

"But you can't smite Meg. Meg is my friend. She's been taking care of me." Castiel tried to reason with the approaching Angels.

"We're so glad to see that you are alright, Castiel. We were told that you perished some months ago," the other angel said as he took a few sneaky steps towards them.

Cas pulled Meg even further into him when it became obvious that Laoth had no intention of backing down just because Cas told him to.

"Let go of the demon whore and we'll take care of her. Then you can come home with us where you belong," Sorush went on as he continued to close in on them.

"I don't have a home," Cas replied flatly. "I no longer belong in heaven with the rest of you. My place is here now."

"Don't be silly, Castiel," Laoth offered without taking his eyes from Meg. "You belong with us. We are your home. Now stand aside and let us have the demon trash so we can get out of here."

Cas grabbed Meg and tossed her behind him before uttering an ear-splitting "NO!" that shook the glass in the windows and door around them.

The lights shattered above them, spilling glass and debris down on their heads and leaving them in darkness just as a flash of lightning lit the sky outside followed close on the heels of a peal of thunder that seemed to rock the very ground at their feet.

Meg took the opportunity of the distraction and grabbed Cas by the wrist as she bolted out of the door and took off running for her car.

She didn't stop until they were both safely inside and she had the engine going and the car in gear.

She backed out of the spot and started to put the transmission in drive when his hand closed over hers on top of the gear shifter.

"Are you alright?" he asked, in concern.

So much concern that she froze for a moment and just looked at him. "I'm fine," she said after clearing her throat and shaking off his stare. "You are okay?"

"I'm wet," he answered simply. The evidence of the statement was dripping off his hair and landing in fat drops on his shoulder. A smile crossed his lips and it was one that didn't set well with her.

Somehow, she just knew what he was about to do before he did it and she narrowed her eyes at him in warning. "Don't you dare."

He answered by completely ignoring her, bending his head and shaking it rapidly like a dog after a bath.

Water splashed her as if she were still standing outside in the storm and she cursed under her breath as she slammed the car into drive and mashed her foot down on the pedal roughly enough it caused him to jerk sideways in his seat and clutch around for the seat belt.

"Are you certain you can operate this vehicle?" he demanded as his eyes flashed at her angrily.

"I guess we'll find out, won't we?" she smirked as she hooked a quick right down a side street and sent him sprawling into the door.

A left at the next street had him nearly in her lap and she shoved him away forcefully. He pitched back into his own seat with the strength of her push, made a 'humph' sound as all the air left his lungs and leveled her with a glare all in the same instant.

She was too busy concentrating on the road to really see the glare, but she knew it was there. She could feel it.

With one foot on the gas and one of the brake, she banked another corner sending him flying once again as he struggled with his seat belt. His eyes widened in horror was the car fishtailed and spun out on the rain slick roads. She snatched the wheel and let off the gas. The tires screeched in protest.

"Are we being followed?" Cas asked in a calm voice that looked amusing on a face that looked beyond terrified.

"I don't know. You want me to stop and find out?" she snapped as she swerved around a double parked car that was sticking out into her lane.

"Do you know where you're going?" he said, this time with a little more urgency in his voice.

"Yes," she answered curtly.  
"Are we almost there?" he replied with his hands white knuckled on the dash.

She chanced a glance in his direction and gave him a smile. "Just sit back and relax, Feathers. I've got this."

He did neither especially when she darted out behind a car that was moving entirely too slow and narrowly missed a truck coming in the opposite direction.

"Don't you think that driving like this might attract unwanted attention?" he asked through gritted teeth.

"The only attention I'm concerned with is the kind we left behind at the hospital," she answered.

She turned down a side road and realized a fraction of a second too late that it was a one-way street and she was going the wrong way. She cursed under her breath and swerved to avoid the on-coming traffic.

"Then you don't care that that police man just saw you tearing down the road going the wrong way?" was his very calm, very reasonable question.

"Fuck!" she hissed just as the siren sounded out behind her and the flashing blue lights filled her rear view mirror.


	5. Touch

Touch

The screech of the tires on the road rang in his head and, for just an instant, it drowned out the wail of the siren coming from directly behind them.

All the noise was making it harder and harder to hold on to the thread of sanity the Angels' presence had made available to him. He guessed that was what had caused the break in him. He had no other explanation. One minute he was struggling, fighting so hard for just a grain of clarity. The next moment his mind had been clear and unburdened. The Angels' arrival had been the only differing factor.

That had to be the cause. He didn't believe in coincidences.

Now the further they got from the Angelic presence at the hospital, the more he had to fight to hold on to the present.

He took his eyes from the road before him for a moment and chanced a glance to his left. Meg's shoulders were rigid and tense as she maneuvered the compact car through the traffic filled streets. At first, she'd stayed to the back roads in a need to put some distance between them and the asylum. Since the police car had spotted them, she'd pulled into traffic, hoping to get lost in the shuffle of all the other moving vehicles.

It was working to some extent. The sirens sounded further away now. Not gone, but at least not right on top of them anymore either. That was something.

He looked back to the road and found himself impressed with her ability to handle the car. It's movements were smooth and fluid as they dashed in and out, around this truck and behind that car. It was making him dizzy, the scene playing out in the windshield. It was like watching someone playing a video game. What was that game Sam and Dean played sometimes? He couldn't remember the title. But he remembered the cars speeding along a road and there were police chasing them as well.

_Need for Speed, that was it, _he thought to himself. All that was missing was the music.

On impulse and in the hopes that it might muffle all the other noises happening around him, he turned on the radio, found a song that felt appropriate and cranked the volume. He had no idea what the tune was called, but it felt right and just as he had hoped, it helped drowned all the other noise. It was something Dean would have approved of. Honestly, He had never understood the way the brothers fought over the radio. It all sounded okay to him. He liked music.

Even now as they barreled down the road with angels, demons and cops right on their tails, he noticed his fingers were no longer gripping the dash in a death-like grasp, but instead were tapping along to the rhythm of the song.

Meg noticed, too and she chuckled as she threw him a sideways glance. "Enjoying yourself, Clarence?" she asked sarcastically as she jerked the wheel to the side and whipped them around a semi moving too slow for her taste.

"Actually, yes, I am," he smiled. "It's nice to get out."

She laughed again. "I'm so glad that your being entertained."

"Where exactly are we going? Do you have a plan or are you hoping that the police will simply give up and go away?" he asked, knowing he was baiting her.

He liked baiting her. It was fun to watch the fire flash in her eyes when his words angered her. He shouldn't enjoy making her mad, and he really couldn't explain why he did. He liked it when she snapped at him. He liked throwing words back at her.

"I have a place set up. That's where were going. You didn't think I wouldn't have a plan in case something like this happened, did you?"

"No, I didn't think you would have thought that far ahead."

"It's not an accident that I'm still alive, Feathers. I know how to save my skin and it's a good thing since this time I'm saving yours as well."

"Watch that truck!" he yelled as a bright red four by four suddenly appeared in their path.

She slammed on the brakes sending him flying against his seat belt, let out a cuss word and jerked the wheel to the left to avoid a collision.

"Stop distracting me!" she yelled back at him.

"How am I distracting you? I'm just talking and you started it."

She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and he watched as she bite down on it. "Why aren't you coco for Cocoa Puffs again? Shouldn't you be drooling on yourself by now?"

"I think it's the angels. It seems I can think clearer when they're near," he explained his theory.

"I could let you go with them, if that's what you want," she offered with honest sincerity in her voice. "If they can help you, maybe you should go."

"Why do you care whether they can help me or not? Aren't you keeping me with you so I can save you from Crowley? Letting me go wouldn't be in your best interest," he asked, turning in his seat to see her better.

"So you think you're my prisoner?"

She made a quick exit off the interstate they'd been traveling down. Then she made a right down a side street, found a spot and ducked into it. Then she snapped the lights off and killed the engine.

"Is this where we're going?" he asked, reaching for the door handle.

"No, we're just waiting out the cops," she answered.

"Well, then, no I don't think I'm your prisoner. I'm just not sure why you're here or why you're going through all this trouble for me."

She shrugged and adjusted in her own seat, turning to face him better as well. "Let's just say, I like knowing you owe me one."

"I owe you more than one," he said, quietly.

"Who's counting?"

"I'm pretty sure you are."

"I'm just a girl trying to stay alive." She shrugged again. "You seem like my best bet."

"What happens when we get to this safe place you have set up?" he asked, changing the subject.

"We hide, lay low until I can figure out what to do next. I'll call the Brothers Grimm and see what they say."

"What do the writers of macabre fairy tales have to do with anything?"

She rolled her eyes. "Sam and Dean"

"Oh," he said then laughed at the reference. It suited them well.

They grew quiet for a while and he spent the time simply looking at her. She was dividing her attention between looking out the windshield and glancing in the rear view mirror watching for any sign that they may have been spotted. Her dark eyes flashed quickly between the two. He liked her eyes, so dark and piercing. He imagined they could kill a man with nothing more than a look. They were dangerous, her eyes, and so very alert and intelligent. Thick, dark lashes, irises the color of bittersweet chocolate, yes, he liked her eyes.

He also liked her lips, so full and luscious. She had a delightful habit of biting down on the bottom one and holding between her perfectly straight, white teeth. He'd seen her do it several times. He liked the way the white of her teeth contrasted with the pink of her lips.

He liked her hair as well. Right now it was down, falling around her shoulders in a wild, untamed array of black curls. He wondered what it would feel like.

Without giving it another thought, he reached out and ran his fingers through it. She jerked her head away from him in surprise and gave him a look that made him withdraw his hand quickly.

"I just wanted to know what it felt like," he explained when she continued to stare at him.

Suddenly, she relaxed. "It's okay, just give a girl a little warning. I'm not big on touching."

"I didn't mean to startle you."

She shifted in her seat, apparently satisfied that they were safe and started the car. The sudden blaring of the radio made him jump and she reached up and flipped it off before pulling out of the spot and taking off at a normal speed down the deserted side street.

"Why is that?" he asked, still focused on her hair.

"Why is what?"

"Why aren't you big on touching?"

She squirmed a little in her seat and he understood that the question had made her uncomfortable. He didn't think she was going to answer, so he was surprised when she glanced in his direction and wet her lips. "I haven't had much experience with it, I guess. At least not good ones."

"I'm sorry," he offered lamely and really wanted to reach out to her again, but he held back the impulse. "I like touching very much. I like the feel of all the different textures. It's fascinating."

She smirked. "You sound like Spock."

"What is a Spock?" he asked, confused.

She rolled her eyes again. "You could really use some lessons in pop culture."

This was something he'd already realized himself. "Yes," he nodded. "Sam and Dean are always saying things I don't understand. Maybe you could teach me."

Suddenly, her hand fell to his knee and she gave it a squeeze. "Oh Sweetheart, there are so many things I could teach you, if we only had the time."

She had to ditch the car. She hated that. She had really grown quite fond of the little white compact. It wasn't anything special, but it handled well and it got great mileage on gas.

She found it's replacement in the long term parking outside the airport. With any luck, the owner of the blue, four door sedan wouldn't even know it was gone for some time and she picked the car specifically because it looked just like every other car on the highway. It didn't stand out, didn't attract attention. She replaced the license plate as an added insurance before giving it a quick hot wire and getting them back on their way.

Cas had been with her for quite a while. She was surprised by that. She hadn't expected him to stay sane as long as he had. Though, if his theory was right, that meant the angels weren't as far behind them as she would have liked. She hadn't truly relaxed until his eyes took on that glossy look that had become normal for him. That was when she knew they were really safe. She hated to lose his company, but it was good to know that the angels weren't going to pop in on them any minute.

It was also nice to know that she would have a little warning before they showed up again. As long as the angel beside her was crazy, they were good. She didn't need to panic until he became lucid.

She'd been driving for a little over an hour when she finally pulled into the tiny, one story house surrounded by several other tiny, one story houses in a nondescript neighborhood in the middle of a nondescript town in Indiana. They were only two towns over from where they'd started and she could have made the trip much faster, but she'd driven around in circles for a while, making sure they weren't being followed.

When she opened his car door, he nearly tumbled out, having fallen asleep while they were driving and she had to make a quick move to catch him.

She finally managed to coax him inside the house and slumped against the door as soon as it closed behind her. She was so tired. The adrenaline had apparently took what was left of her energy with it when it finally stopped pumping through her veins and now she was just plain exhausted.

It was more than a little discouraging to see Castiel still standing exactly where she'd left him, in the middle of the foyer, which actually consisted of two rows of 12'' by 12'', vinyl floor tiles of a hideous fake wood design, with his arms at his sides and a lost look on his face.

She pulled herself from the door, took his hand and lead him through the archway and into a cramped living room on the other side. A half wall sectioned it off from the kitchen. There was an exceptionally ugly brown and orange patterned couch against that wall with two matching chairs flanking it. She maneuvered him around a chunky, dark wood coffee table, with his feet shuffling across the orange shag carpet and deposited him on the sofa while she went to check the rest of the house, flipping on the ancient console television in the corner before she left.

The bathroom was ridiculously small. So were the bedrooms, of which there were two. Both beds were made and ready to be slept in and she was glad for her forethought. She wasn't sure she had enough pep in her to make them up now.

Again, he was right where she left him when she returned and again she was a little disappointed, but it made getting him ready for bed a breeze. He didn't fight her while she rid him of the plain white scrubs the patients in the asylum wore. He didn't argue while she dressed him in a pair of pajamas she'd stashed at the house for just such an occasion. And he was completely compliant when she put him into bed and tucked the plain white sheet and burgundy colored comforter around him.

Meg Masters was a tough girl. She was a practical, pragmatic kind of girl that didn't indulge in luxury or flights of fancy. Her tastes were simple, basic. She didn't bother with things that didn't serve a purpose or fill a need. It didn't make sense to her. Why take the time? She had better things to do, more important things to do.

Maybe it was because she was a demon. She didn't need to luxuriate in bed all day. She didn't need to sleep, after all. She didn't have to pander to a desire for savory foods or fine wine. She didn't need to eat, after all. And cheap whiskey got her just as drunk as expensive spirits.

But there was one purely human vise that she did let herself enjoy and she really couldn't explain why even to herself. It was the one thing she'd found on Earth that made her understand those humans that lived their lives in the pursuit of pleasure.

Soft candlelight filled the tiny space with a warm, yellow glow that bespoke peace and relaxation. Add to that the fragrance of lavender and vanilla in the air and the almost scalding hot water cradling her body and she was lulled into a trance-like state of pure nirvana. The bubbles riding on the water's surface caressed her skin as the sound of soft jazz played from a small old fashion radio she'd picked up for just this purpose.

She used to look forward to being sent to Earth on errands for Crowley just because it meant she might find a few hours for this.

And while there had been many other reasons she'd chosen the safe house, practical reasons, sound reasons, she couldn't say the over-sized, cast iron, claw foot tub she now found herself in hadn't played, at least, a minor role in her decision. It had been a big draw for her. And she'd been looking forward to delighting in its pleasures since they'd arrived.

Closing her eyes, she laid her head back against the tub's side and let herself drift away on the cloud of euphoria brought on by her surroundings. It was better than any drug she'd ever tried and she was pretty sure she'd tried them all.

The water was just beginning to take on a chill when she suddenly felt as if she were being watched. A quick glance at the door, which she'd left cracked in order to hear Castiel if he needed her, found the man standing there with his arms slack at his sides and that foggy look on his face.

"What are you doing out of bed?" she asked as she snatched the vinyl curtain decorated with bright yellow ducks back to cover herself and peaked around it's side.

He just stood there staring at her blankly without answering.

"Hasn't anyone ever told you that it's creepy to watch girls take baths, Feathers? Surely your pet humans have had this talk with you before," she teased, hoping to spark a reaction from him.

When she still got nothing in return, she gave a defeated sigh, stood up from the water and tried to make a grab for the beige towel she'd left on the sink. It was too far a reach for her from inside the tub and she realized she'd have to let the curtain go and get out in order to get to it.

She glanced at him again, searching for anything coherent on his face. What she found there wasn't what she was expecting.

"I couldn't find you," he said lamely as he rang his hands nervously. "I didn't mean to intrude."

"It's okay, Sweetie. But you could do me a solid and hand me the towel."

He stepped forward gingerly and reached out for the towel, then handed it over using the full length of his arm as if he were afraid she might bite him if he came any closer.

"Now, how's about you go get back in bed and I'll be right there to tuck you in?" she suggested in her sweetest tone.

He made to turn away from her, but stopped before completing the movement and turned back. "I didn't mean to watch you, but you are very beautiful," he said in a nervous voice that sounded almost breakable.

She felt the odd sensation of a flush rising in her cheeks and went quickly about wrapping the towel tightly around herself before securing it with a careful tuck and stepping out of the tub.

She was just about to thank him for the compliment when his face went slack and he was gone once again.

Leaving him standing outside the bathroom door, she dried off and dressed quickly in the red satin pajama short set she'd set out with the towel.

She cursed under her breath when she found him still standing outside the door and took his hand to lead him back to bed. This was getting ridiculous. It was like playing that stupid red light, green light game that children played. One second he was there, the next gone again.

She got him tucked back into bed and flipped off the light. Then she turned to leave, but stopped when she felt his hand on her wrist.

"Stay," he whispered into the darkness of the room. When she hesitated, he tightened his grasp and added an even quieter, "Please".

With that one word she forgot the list of reasons she'd been silently compiling in her head about how it was a bad idea and climbed in beside him.

"Can I..." he began then let the rest of the sentence fall into the silence like he wasn't sure of how to finish the thought.

"Can you what, Cas?" she asked as she settled her head onto the pillow.

"May I touch you?" he said shakily. She was laying on her side, turned away from him and couldn't see the nervousness on his face, but she could definitely hear it in his voice.

She jerked her head around to see him better. "What!" she demanded.

He looked completely lost for a moment, unsure of how to explain his words. "You asked me to warn you before I touched you again. I just meant... would it be alright if I did this?" He slowly slid his arm around her waist and stayed tense and ready to spring back until she nodded her consent. Then he relaxed and let out a breath that she felt skirt across the nape of her neck.

"See," he said with a sleepy sigh. "Touching isn't so bad."

She covered his hand with her own and let herself ease into the feel of the solid warmth of his body against her back. As she drifted off to sleep she found herself agreeing. Touching really wasn't so bad.


	6. Asking us to Dance

Carry on my Wayward Son

The air was thick and heavy with a dense, weighty fog that stuck to her skin as she took a step forward and began to assess her surroundings. The first thing she noticed was the sound of music coming from somewhere off in the distance. It was muffled and she couldn't make it out clearly but the fog was so heavy it was all there was to grab hold of so she followed it.

Her shoes clicked against what sounded like pavement and it startled her. She had never been one for wearing shoes that made clicking noises when she walked. But she recognized the feel of heels on her feet. A glance down found that the pajamas she'd gone to bed in were gone and she now wore some kind of God awful midnight blue chiffon thing with a sweetheart neckline that plunged deeply and gathered at her right hip. She could feel the fullness of the skirt as it danced around her calves when she took a step.

Panic begin to build inside her as she continued on towards the source of the music, but she pushed it down and tried to concentrate, gathering as much information as she could. Problem was, there was no information to gather. Nothing but the sound of pavement under her feet, the vintage style dress she found herself suddenly wearing and the fog.

The music was closer now, she could almost make it out. And just as her mind began to work on the task of recognizing the faintly familiar song she heard footsteps coming up behind her.

All her instincts went instantly on alert. She narrowed her eyes and stared in the direction of the steps that were rapidly gaining ground on her. They would be on her any second now, close enough to see. A body slowly began to emerge from the clouds and she felt a flush of relief wash over her.

Cas was no longer in his pajamas either, but instead wore a charcoal gray pinstriped suit that looked to have come from the same era as her dress.

"Meg?" Castiel asked as he finally came close enough to see her clearly. "What's going on? Where are we?"

"I was hoping you could tell me."

"I've never seen anything like this. But I can think clearly, maybe there are angels around somewhere close by," he guessed.

"Can angels do things like this?" she asked, holding up the hem of her dress.

He looked her up and down and gave her a smile. "It's very nice. Yes, angels could do something like this, if they wanted. The question would be why."

"The music is coming from somewhere around here. I was following it."

"So was I," he agreed. "There isn't much else to go on."

He adjusted the fedora that was perched at an angle on his head and offered her his hand.

Instead of taking it like he expected her to, she hesitated. "Are we sure this is a good idea? If the angels are making the music, maybe we shouldn't be chasing them down."

He took a step closer to her and whatever he was wearing on his feet sounded out on the flooring as well. "I won't let them hurt you. Trust me."

She put her hand in his and followed along as he moved them towards the sound. He was so different now. All confidence and control, like the Cas she'd first met. It was strange, the change so pronounced she wasn't sure how to react to it.

They moved silently through the fog and she could feel the dampness on her palm where it rested in his. She didn't even know why she was letting him lead her along like a lost child searching for her parent. But she was and there was a certain comfort in the strength of his hand in hers. So she let it go. In fact, it was nice, not being in control. It had been so long since she trusted anyone enough to let them take charge of anything she wasn't quite sure how to step back anymore.

When the building appeared in front of them seemingly from out of nowhere, she hesitated and he gave her hand a squeeze of reassurance. "We'll be fine. I won't let them get to you. You have my word," he told her over his shoulder in a hushed voice and something in his tone made her believe him.

Believing in others wasn't exactly one of her strong suits. She'd been wrong so many times before. But this was different. He owed her. He said so himself and she knew he was a man that paid his debts, even if those debts were to demons like her.

They found the revolving door quickly enough and he gave the hand in his another squeeze before letting it go to step inside. Once she followed him, he made short work of grabbing it again just as soon as she stepped out of the glass enclosure.

The room they found themselves in was smokey and filled with the sound of big band music playing on a stage in the far corner. Between them and it were tables, several, small round ones with white linen tablecloths and stained glass lamps hanging in the center of each one. The lights were low making the smoke appear as if it were dancing to the sound of someone crooning away about leaving their heart in San Francisco or loving New York. She didn't know or care which, she was much more occupied with observing the few beings scattered around the space. Though thankfully they all seemed completely oblivious to their presence.

A couple, young, pretty and fawning over each other, sat in one of the four booths stationed in the corners. A woman, also young and pretty and scantly clad carried a tray around her neck with cigarettes and cigars displayed inside. A man, big, brawny and looking every bit like the bouncer he was supposed to be adjusted the jacket of his tuxedo and Meg noticed it bulge just slightly at the shoulder, showing her he was packing a weapon of some kind, most likely a gun. Another couple, this pair older, gray-haired and distinguished looking twirled around a dance floor that sat next to the stage. The man looked completely at ease in his finery while the woman's dress, much the same style as Meg's but in a deep burgundy color swirled and flared around her calves when he gave her a spin.

Cas was ignoring them all, his attention solely and completely on the man on stage. He edged them closer and squinted his eyes to better see into the spotlight shining on his target.

"Chuck?" he whispered quietly, almost under his breath and if Meg had been any further away she would have missed it.

"You know that guy?" she asked, leaning in close enough to hear over the music that was getting louder the closer they got to the stage.

"I think so," he answered though his voice was unsure.

"Is he the one that brought us here?" she pressed, needing some answers.

Suddenly the music stopped and everyone in the room turned their attention to them as the spotlight spun around and lit them up like a Christmas tree.

"I did indeed bring you here," the man said. His hair, beard and goatee were all three shaggy and unkempt. His jacket was gone and his once crisp white shirt was wrinkled and a touch damp with sweat. A gray stripe almost as dark as the blackness of his pants ran down the outer seam of both legs and his shoes, white spats with black trim sounded out against the light colored wood of the stage like they were made for tap dancing as he took a step towards them.

He held a tall metal mic stand in one hand, the microphone itself in the other and the stand teetered for a moment before righting itself when he abruptly let it go. His smile was warm, charismatic and welcoming when he turned it on them and gave out a whooping laugh of amusement. "Actually, I brought him here, but he didn't seem too thrilled with the prospect of leaving you behind so I added your ticket as a bonus."

Cas used his hand in hers to pull her in tighter to his back at this and she let him without argument. "Who is this guy?" she asked in his ear.

"I'm standing right here. You are welcome to address me yourself, Miss," the man said. "I promise not to bite."

She swallowed hard and summoned up an enormous amount of courage before clearing her throat. "Alright, who the hell are you?"

"He's Chuck, a prophet of the Lord," Cas answered before the man had a chance in a voice that rang out loud and echoed off the walls.

The man put his hand to his chest and gave Cas a wink. "Are you sure about that, Castiel? I mean, you gotta ask yourself, how could a lowly prophet pull off something like this?" He waved his hand around in the air to indicate the space. "But if prophet is the label you're comfortable with, we can go with that." He leaned in a little closer to them and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Still, this is something, isn't it?"

"Where are we? Why have you brought me here? How, for that matter?" Cas began firing off questions in rapid session.

"You are in my place. You're here because I brought you here. I brought you here because I needed to talk to you. And as for how, I'll let you work that one out for yourselves. Feel free to throw out guesses though. I'll let you know whether you're hot or cold." Chuck said as he came to the edge of the platform and sat down with his legs hanging over the side. He pulled the bow tie free and let it hang loosely around his collar. Then unbuttoned the top couple of buttons on his shirt.

"Hot or cold? I don't understand," Cas said and Meg gave his shoulder a nudge.

"It's a game, a children's game that we aren't going to play," she explained impatiently before turning her attention to Chuck. "Say whatever it is you need to say and let us go back where we came from."

"Why so impatient to leave? You just got here. Why not enjoy it for a moment?"

"I want to leave because we don't belong here. Let us go," she retorted.

Chuck turned back to Cas and ignored her. "Is she always this cranky? I have to say I was more than a little surprised to find her sharing your bed." He tisked at him in disapproval. "Really, Castiel, the company you're keeping these days."

"Why did you bring us here, Chuck?" Cas asked again.

Chuck sighed dramatically and his smile disappeared. "It looked like you might need some help. I thought I'd be a nice guy and offer my assistance. But if you're going to be like that about it, I can put you back where I found you and we can pretend this never happened. It's up to you."

"What kind of help?" Meg asked.

"Well, I know how to take the Fruit Loops out of our friend here on a more permanent basis, for starters. And I might be able to hide you from the Demons that are chasing you."

"How's that?" Cas asked.

"I have my ways," Chuck answered with a maniacal smile. "What do you say? You want my help or not?"

"Not," Meg answered without hesitating.

"Wait," Cas threw over his shoulder at her. "Maybe we should. If he can help me with the voices in my head, it might be worth it. Besides, he's always been on our side in the past."

"You trust him?" she asked, stepping in closer and lowering her voice.

"There's really no need to whisper. I'm right here. It's not like I can't hear you." Chuck intoned.

Meg rolled her eyes at him, unimpressed by the geeky little midget or the show he was putting on for them. But the look in Cas' eyes and their need for his sanity made her give an impatient sigh. "What kind of help can you give us with Cas?"

"I can tell you what you need to do to make him not crazy."

She took a step out from behind the angel coming to his side instead. "And what is all this going to cost us?"

"Cost you?" Chuck asked with raised eyebrows. "How very cynical! Maybe I'm just offering because I'm a nice guy and I can help."

"Right," she nodded sarcastically. "And I'm the Queen of Hell."

Chuck chuckled. "Not yet, but I like your ambition." He got back to his feet and rubbed his palms on the thighs of his pants. "Alright, how about I'll tell you what you want to know for the price of a dance?"

Meg laughed this time. "You want to dance with me? Or did you mean him?" She shrugged. "I'm not judging, I just want to be clear."

"No, I meant you and him," he clarified.

"You want us to dance?" Cas asked.

"That's the going rate. Take it or leave it."

"Why?" Meg couldn't help but ask.

Chuck shrugged and gave her a wink that set her teeth to grinding. "Just call me a romantic."

Cas turned to her, leveling her with a look that belied his need for answers, his need for a chance at the sanity that was being offered.

"You know this is some kind of a trick, right? Nothing is ever this easy and the price is going to be way more than a dance," she tried to reason with him.

"I trust him. If he says all he wants is a dance then I believe him," he reiterated.

She rolled her eyes again. "Of course you do. But don't say I didn't warn you and trust me, I'm going to say I told you when this all goes to hell."

He gave her a rare smile and she basked in it for a moment. "I'll let you."

"You won't have a choice," she smiled back at him.

He gave her hand a squeeze in way of saying thanks and turned back to Chuck. "We don't have any music," then he turned back to her. "And you know I've never danced before?"

Another eye roll followed a sarcastic, "Of course not."

Suddenly, Chuck somehow appeared right behind Castiel and Meg had to fight to hide the startled surprise from her face. She would rather he not know that he'd caught her off guard. He placed a hand on Cas' shoulder and she could see a shudder run through the angel. "I think I can help with both of those," he said smoothly before popping out of existence again and reappearing a moment later back on the stage.

"What the hell was that?" Meg asked, turning accusing eyes to the weird little man that reminded her so much of a hairless troll.

"I helped," he shrugged.

She looked back to Cas who was smiling like an imbecile. "It's okay. I'm not hurt."

A noise caused her to glance down and find Cas' foot tapping to some rhythm that only he could hear.

She looked back at Chuck and narrowed her eyes.

"What?" he asked, feigning innocence. "You would've rather I left him alone so he could spend the whole song trampling your feet?"

"I would rather you not touch either of us again," she answered. She looked down at the still tapping foot then back up into Cas' face. "You're sure you're okay?"

In a lightning quick move that she couldn't have possibly prepared for, he reached out and hauled her against his chest. One of his arms moved to the small of her back while the other took her hand in his and he entwined their fingers together.

"I thought you said you'd never done this before," she questioned when he said nothing but wiggled his eyebrows at her.

"I haven't, but Chuck helped."

"Helped how?" She tried to ask, but a sudden swell of music cut her off before she had a chance.

Then the lights in the club lowered even further and she was moving. Cas used his body to propel her backwards until they were in the middle of the part of the club that had been set aside as a dance floor. But the dance floor was gone now and in its place was a clearing in the woods surrounded by tall pine trees that swayed in a comfortable breeze. Beside it was a lake nearly encompassed by a ring of Cypress trees with their long, furry branches stretched over the crystal clear, perfectly calm waters.

Cas didn't seem a bit fazed by the change, instead he gave her a twirl that took her breath away a moment before he pulled her back in and stole it again with the feel of his solid chest pressing into hers.

Then Chuck stepped up the microphone on the stage that now stood beside the lake and began to sing.

_There's a full moon up and rising. _

_There's a whisper of the breeze_

_Blowing through the tangle silver _

_hanging from the Cypress trees._

_There's a river made of moonlight_

_flowing clear across the lake _

_And there's a million stars just waiting _

_to fall for any wish we make._

_Darling, tonight I am reminded _

_how much these two hearts need romance._

_You know it isn't all that often we get this kind of chance._

_Why don't we get caught in this moment,_

_Be victims of sweet circumstance?_

_Tonight I feel like all Creation is_

_Asking is us to dance. _

Cas leaned in and tighten his hold on her hold, giving her a little warning this time before he once again sent her spinning out the length of his arm, then tugged her back into him just as smoothly.

_They'll be time enough tomorrow_

_To get back to our daily bread_

_But there's something about this evening_

_That's put this notion in my head_

_The Heaven and the Earth are meeting_

_tonight upon this very spot _

_and all the things on Earth worth having _

_are things that we've already got. _

She couldn't keep herself from burying her head into the warmth of his chest and letting the music, the breeze, the hint of jasmine in the air, the full moon shining down on her, all of it, carry her away as it filled her head with things that couldn't possibly be real. It was all too surreal, too fantastical and she tried to fight the pull that seems to hang in the very air she pulled into her lungs with each breath, but it was impossible to resist. He was impossible to resist. She'd kept her gaze glued to the lapel of his suit until that point, though she could feel him staring down at her. The heavy weight of his eyes were nearly overwhelmingly compelling as they pleaded for her to return his stare.

Finally, her body betrayed her and she glanced up and found just exactly what she was expecting, him staring down with those sparkling blue, soulful eyes.

The moment their eyes met, something sparked between them, an electricity that ran through the length of her body and caused him to give another shudder in testament that he'd felt it, too. Her head swam and if it hadn't been for his hand on her back, she'd have stumbled. But he held her steady and continued to dance.

_Darling, tonight I am reminded _

_How much these two hearts need romance._

_You know it isn't very often we get this kind of chance._

_Why don't we get caught in this moment_

_Be victims of sweet circumstance?_

_Tonight I feel like all Creation is _

_Asking us to dance. _

As the soft guitar sounds took over for the lyrics, Cas splayed his fingers out across her back and she tightened her grip on his shoulder, afraid he was about to do something she would need to hold on for. She was right a moment later, when he leaned her backwards, his body following along in a classic, well executed, dip that left her breathless.

He pulled her back upright gently as the last few stains of the song played themselves out. And the look on his face said he couldn't have been prouder of himself.

He dropped his arm from around her and took an awkward step backwards, but he didn't let her other hand go. In fact, since they'd found each other in the fog, he'd maintained his hold on her. And she wasn't arguing. There was something reassuring about the feel of his much larger hand folded around hers.

He used that hand to pull her off the floor and back to their place by the stage to the sound of Chuck clapping enthusiastically. By the time they arrived the club was once again surrounding them, right back the way it was when they first came in.

"That was beautiful. Just beautiful. You two kids make one hell of a couple. Has anyone ever told you that?" He said as soon as they stopped in front of him.

"We did what you asked, now let's have the information," she demanded, stepping out from behind her Angelic cover once again. For some reason, it seemed to her that Cas was using himself as something of a shield between her and Chuck. Whether it was for his safety or hers she couldn't begin to guess and really she didn't care. She was done playing along with the geeky little troll.

"Alright, alright, a deal is a deal and I never go back on my word. Let me just say thank you, though. Dean and Sam would never have played along you like two have."

"Yeah, well, Sam and Dean couldn't have pulled off that dip like we did, so we played, now you pay," Meg returned.

He came to the edge of the platform again and again he sat and dangled his feet over the edge. "Okay, there is a woman," he began.

"A woman? Or something more than that?"

"Well, she's just a human, but she hangs with a pretty tough crowd, demons and the like," he clarified.

"And what does this woman do? What does she have to do with us?" Meg continued to press.

"You may have heard about her. She's kind of a legend." Chuck shifted, making himself more comfortable. "She's a Shaman, and she's the real deal. No smoke and mirrors, just good old fashion magic. I think she can help Castiel here with his case of crazy. She has a real touch with head issues."

"So she's a healer?" Castiel asked, speaking up for the first time since the dance.

"Not exactly. She's more of a Journey Woman."

"A Journey Woman?" Meg scoffed. "You mean peyote, sweat lodges, sand drawings and howling at the moon?"

"The demons that protect her call her the Dream-walker," Chuck answered. "That's what she does, she goes into people's dreams and helps them navigate the waters of their subconscious, a cruise director for the dream world, I guess you could say."

"Where do we find this cruise director?" Meg asked.

"She's from a tribe of Abnaki Indians. Her names Abornazine."

"Abnaki, that's a Canadian tribe, right?" Castiel replied.

"Typically, but you can find this one in Vermont. Swanton to be exact, up on Lake Champlain."

Meg shifted from one foot to the other as she tried to relieve the pressure the heels were putting on her aching feet. She hated wearing heels. "So we go to Vermont and find this Abornazine and she can cure Castiel?"

Chuck shrugged. "Maybe. It's worth a shot."

Castiel glanced around at their surroundings then back at Chuck. "If you can do all this, why can't you just cure me?"

It was a good question and one Meg had intended to ask as well.

Chuck lumbered to his feet tiredly, then hopped down from the stage and stepped up to them. Cas discreetly pulled Meg back behind him once again and she let him. She didn't want to be within touching distance of the man either, whatever he really was.

"You did this to yourself, Cas. I can't just come in and clean it up for you. Abornazine can't do that either. You have to do it, but I think she can help. She can guide you," chuck explained.

"Alright, you said something about being able to hide us from the demons, that might be helpful if I'm supposed to haul his crazy ass all the way to Vermont," Meg interrupted.

Chuck turned his attention to her and something in his gaze almost made her take a step back away from him. She didn't like the scrutiny. She didn't like the way he seemed to see things she didn't want him to see. His eyes were penetrating, like he was searching her soul for answers to questions he hadn't asked out loud. "Tell me something first," he said after a long moment of silence. "I'm having trouble figuring this all out. I know what he's doing here. I get him. But why are you here? Why are you offering to haul his crazy ass anywhere? This isn't even your fight. Why not just drop him off at the Winchester's door and be done with it?"

Meg shifted, putting herself subconsciously a little further behind Castiel. "Why does that matter? I'm here and I'm not going anywhere. Isn't that enough?" she hedged.

Chuck stepped to the side around Cas and continued his perusal of her. "Not really. What I'm offering is a gift for someone like you. I need to know that you aren't going to take it run the second you can. I can't have you abandoning my favorite Angel at the blink of an eye. Castiel has a job to do and he needs help right now. I have to know I can count on you. He seems to feel like he can. I just can't wrap my head around why."

"Like I said, I'm not going anywhere. But if you don't believe me, that's fine, at least give your little gift to Cas. It'll keep him safe at the very least, right?" she offered impatiently.

Chuck raised his hand like he was about to reach out to touch her, but Cas was suddenly there, right between them, blocking his attempted. "It will help to shield you from the demons, Big Guy. But it'll help a lot more to shield you both since you don't like the prospect of going on without her." Chuck argued, not taking his eyes from Meg until he was done talking and even then it was just for a moment to judge Castiel's reaction. He apparently didn't like the foreboding look he received from the fallen Angel because he gave an exasperated huff of impatience. "I'm not going to hurt her. If I wanted to do that I could have ganked her when I found her in your bed. You have my word. I just need to see."

"See what exactly?" Castiel asked, taking yet another step between them.

"Why?" Chuck answered simply. Then with a nonchalant wave of his hand, Castiel was sudden on the other side of Meg, behind her instead of in front of her and Chuck was baring down on her.

Cas squeezed her hand as Chuck raised his and placed it very carefully against the side of her face. His finger found her temple and pressed into her skin. "Let me guess," she chuckled when no pain came from his touch. "Is this supposed to be some kind of _Vulcan Mind Meld_?"

Chuck chuckled right back at her. "Something like that." A moment later he dropped his hand as he muttered, "Now I see," under his breath. Then he raised both his hands, gave them one last look and said loudly and clearly. "You'll thank me for this later."

With that, his hand contacted with both their foreheads and Meg felt as if she were being shoved backwards with the force of a tornado. Castiel's hand tightened in hers as he held on with a bone crushing grip.

The last thing she heard before the void took over was Chuck's voice ringing in her head. "Carry on my wayward Son," he called out in the darkness.


	7. I'm not in love

The soft strands of early dawn light seeped in around the light blue curtain hanging across the window over the bed. Meg felt herself coming awake and a jolt of startled surprise at her unfamiliar surroundings took the rest of the sleep from her mind. She was instantly awake and immediately aware that she wasn't alone.

A moment later, she relaxed as the memories from the night before replaced the fog of drowsiness. Castiel's warm breath blew across the nape of her neck and at first it annoyed her. But it only took a minute of endurance for that annoyance to become comfort.

She thought about jumping up out of the bed like she'd done the day before, but the effort it would take seemed too huge to tackle. So instead, she snuggled back down into the warmth he offered her and just let herself enjoy it.

She shouldn't. She knew that. There was no way all this was going to end well. He was an Angel. Her, a demon. Nothing but bad could come from this. And she tried to tell herself that over and over. The warning bells sounded out in her head every time he took her hand, every time she caught him looking at her like he was a starving man and she was dinner, every time he said something that made a lump form in her throat.

It was happening more and more often of late. And it was getting out of hand. She had to keep reminding herself that it was all because he wasn't himself. If he was in his right mind, he'd never be looking at her with those doe eyes like that. If he was in his right mind, he'd be trying to gank her as surely as she was lying there.

That was who he was, a soldier, through and through. A man with a mission and that mission included ridding the earth of things like her. He needed her. That was the only reason she was still alive. The only other explanation was that he actually cared and that was crazy. An angel caring about a demon, what was next, cats and dogs living together?

No, she would not be playing Juliette to his Romeo in some entirely too warped version of a tale that never ended in anything but disaster.

So she would have to make him understand that this thing between them, whatever it was, was not going to happen. She could do it. The problem wouldn't be convincing him. It would be convincing herself.

She had to stop feeling the stab of pleasure she felt every time his skin brushed hers. She had to stop the elation she felt every time she looked at him and found him looking back at her with eyes that said he was really seeing her. She had to stop thinking about the one kiss they'd shared years before like she found herself doing every time she was idle for a moment.

This undeniable attraction was easily explained. After all, they were all they had at the moment. Being thrust into life or death situations and having to rely solely on each other for survival could easily be misinterpreted as something deeper. Relationships based on intense experiences never worked. Add to that the fact that they were a different species all together and it was obvious that this would never, could never work.

Besides, it wasn't like she was in love with the man. She didn't do love. She wasn't even sure she was capable of the emotion. That stab of pleasure at his touch was just the result of her love of danger. And like it or not, he was a danger to her. That elation she felt when she found him not crazy, that was simply her relief at not having to take care of his every need for a few moments. And the memory of the kiss... Okay that one might not be as quickly explained, but there was an explanation. There had to be. And it had to be something besides her wanting him. She'd figure out a way to make that make sense, she just needed some time to think about it.

She rolled over. She didn't know why she did it. She knew better before she made the move. Having him behind her was the safest place for him to be. She could almost disassociate him with the pleasantness he was inspiring in her when she didn't have to look at him at the same time. But it seemed like what her brain wanted and what her body wanted were at opposite ends of the spectrum lately and she was having trouble making the warring parties find some common ground.

She knew she made a mistake the minute her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting enough to really see him. A beam of sunlight fell across her face. He was lost in peaceful sleep, slumbering away without a care for the danger they were in. There was no way she would even think about begrudging him that. Seeing him without the constant crease between his brows as he struggled for clarity was such a rare thing. It was nice to see him so serene and unencumbered. Though, she reminded herself quickly, it was just common decency that inspired those feelings, nothing more than that.

She raised her hand, having it pull it free from where it was trapped at her side by his arm draped over her, and traced the place between his brows with her fingertip, enjoying the smooth skin she found there. Then she moved to his cheek and brushed across the first signs of early morning stubble there. She relished in the roughness for just long enough to realize what she was feeling.

Stubble, Castiel didn't have stubble. His hair didn't grow. In the entire time she'd been taking care of him, she'd never had to bother with shaving him or keeping his hair trimmed. He wasn't human.

She leaned away from him, far enough to better take him in. He didn't look any different. Again, she placed her hand against his cheek. He didn't feel any different aside from the new growth of facial hair.

Just as she was about to brush the whole thing off as some kind of unexplained phenomenon, her stomach gave a loud, vicious-sounding growl.

She glanced down at the offending part of her anatomy in surprise and shock. She didn't get hungry. She couldn't even remember the last time she'd eaten anything. But she recognized the sound and the feeling from her time as a human.

She reached out a hand to Castiel's shoulder and was just about to shake him awake when his lips began to move and he was mumbling under his breath. She leaned in closer, trying to make out his words and only barely caught a few. The few she caught were enough.

_Chuck, _now she remembered. The dream came flooding back to her with perfect clarity as his final words rang in her head, _"You'll thank me for this later."_

He'd told them he could hide them from the demons. Was this how he accomplished that, by turning them both human? Could he have done something like that?

She thought about waking Cas again, but changed her mind when her stomach gave another growl and his sounded out as well.

She needed to find them food, something she hadn't thought about before. There wasn't even anything like that stocked in the house. There hadn't been a need for it.

She took a moment to be thankful that her pajamas were back in place and the dress she'd been wearing in the dream was long gone. Then she paused long enough to snatch a few things from the closet she'd had the forethought to fill when she set the house up.

She'd just finished changing her clothes when she heard the soft knock on the bathroom door. "Meg?" Cas called a few minutes later.

Snatching the door back, she caught him just as he was raising his hand to knock again. "I know," she said without waiting for him to say anything.

"But how?" he asked, though he seemed a little distracted and she could tell the voices in his head were getting louder by the moment. "Could Chuck have done this to us?"

She sighed heavily. "I guess this was what he meant when he said he could hide us from the demons."

"My stomach hurts," he replied simply.

"That's because you're hungry. I'm on my way to the store."

"You can cook?" he asked warily like he wouldn't believe her even if she assured him she could.

"I can manage," she answered a little snappishly. Then her face softened and she couldn't help but give him a reassuring smile. "We'll be fine."

His face twisted for a moment, but he recovered. "This is going to complicate things."

"I know, but it's okay. We'll get you to Vermont and find this dream person and she'll help you with the crazy. Then we can figure out where to go from there." She promised him.

He raised his hand and she almost ducked away from it. It was her survival instinct kicking in. Those were the instincts that had kept her alive. An angel raises his hand towards her, she should duck, she should flee. But instead she watched in utter fascination when his hand came to her shoulder and his lips turned up in a smile. "Thank you," he said and it was all that he managed before the fight became to much for him, the voices too loud to ignore. His face went slack and his eyes took on that far away, distant look that said he was no longer present.

She was beginning to hate that look. The longer she spent with him when he was sane, the more that look annoyed her. She felt like it was robbing of her something. What, she wasn't sure. Though she steadfastly refused to admit that it was anything more than losing his companionship that bothered her. That was all there was to it. That was all there ever could be.

Taking his hand, she lead him back to the bed and he dutifully shuffled along behind her. Once there, she got him in and watched him for a moment to make sure he was comfortable and settled. Then she grabbed her purse and gave a silent prayer to whoever was listening that he would be safe while she was gone.

She thought about him the entire time she was away from the house. He was all she thought about, in fact, as she loaded items into a shopping cart while rapidly dashing around the store. She needed to get back to him. He was alone now. There was no other hospital staff to keep an eye on him in her absence and scenario after scenery of disasters played out in her mind. Everything from the house catching fire to someone breaking in to Angels or Demons finding him danced in her brain making her jumpy and irritable. That was evident when she snapped at the slow moving cashier and trust a handful of money at her in the check out line.

When she got back to the safe house, she abandoned the bag of groceries to the backseat and darted inside to check on him. She found him in the living room, sitting Indian-style in the middle of the room with her stolen Angel sword in his lap. His eyes were still just as lost as they were when she left him, but something seemed to spark when she waved her hand in front of his face and called his name.

"Cas? What happened? Are you alright?" she asked, kneeling beside him and pulling the sword away.

His fingers grasped hold of the hilt but he gave up the fight when she applied just a touch of insistence to the issue and it slid safely out of his grip. She laid it down on the floor behind her, out of his reach.

"Did someone try to break in?" she asked, taking his chin in her hand and raising his eyes to hers.

All at once he seemed to register her presence. He came up on his knees so quickly it was a blur of movement and suddenly she found herself with his arms locked around her and her head pressed to his chest. "I couldn't find you," he whispered desperately into her hair. "I thought you left me."

Her arms reluctantly went around his waist and she settled in and let him hold her for a moment when she felt him trembling against her. "I told you I was going to the store, remember?" When he didn't answer, she patted his back. "I'm not going anywhere, Clarence. I'm here for the long haul. I promise."

Her words worked to reassure him and slowly he let her go and settled back on his heels. His stomach let out a loud groan against its emptiness and he looked down at it quickly like he was startled by the sound. Then he looked up at her again, expectantly, like he was waiting for her to explain the noise.

"You're hungry. I bought food. You stay here and I'll make us something to eat." She told him as she got to her feet and started off towards the door.

She stopped a second later when she realized he was trailing along behind her and turned to face him with her hand up. It landed in the center of his chest and she gave him a little push. "No, you stay. I'll get the groceries."

The crease between his eyes crinkled and he glanced down at her hand. She started off again, relieved that he hadn't tried to follow her this time.

He was standing right where she left him when she returned with the two brown grocery bags in her hands. She put them on the table. Then went and took his hand to lead him to one of the dining room chairs that surrounded the small, round table.

She made burgers, because it was quick and easy and it was one of the few things she knew how to cook. This human thing was going to get old very fast considering she really had no idea how to prepare food for them. She'd never had to cook before. It had been so long since she'd had to eat.

She put the plate down in front of him and he didn't even glance down at it in response. His eyes were glued to her, watching her every move like he was studying for a test. It was making her jumpy.

She snapped her fingers in his face and he blinked at the sound, but made no move other than that.

With a heavy, tired sigh, she sat down in the chair beside him and took his hands in hers. "Look, Cas, I'm going to need you to help me out here. You have to eat. I can't force you. I know it's hard, but I need you to come back to me for just a few minutes. Just long enough to get this down, then you can go back to wherever it is you spend all your time these days."

He gave no response, still just sitting there, staring at her blankly and it pissed her off. The look, the slump of his shoulders, the furrow between his eyebrows, the slackness of his lips, the limpness of his hands in hers, it all pissed her off. How was this suppose to help them? How could the evil little troll that did this to them possibly believe this would make things better?

Now he was going to starve to death, or die of thirst, one.

She dropped his hands with a huff and got to her feet, jarring her chair in her hast and causing it to fall to the floor with a bang.

Cas was instantly on his feet, grabbing her and hauling her behind him in an attempt to shield her from whatever danger they were suddenly facing.

"It's alright, Feathers. I just knocked over the chair. No one is attacking us," she tried to reassure him.

His eyes darted hurriedly over the room before he turned them on her, looking her up and down to see for himself that she was unharmed.

"So that's what it takes, huh? Whenever I need you here in the real world, all I have to do is make something bang," she chuckled. "I should start carrying around a starter pistol."

His eyes narrowed as if he were trying to make sense of what she was saying and having no luck at all.

She stepped around him and gave him a little nudge to get him back in his chair. "Alright, well, since I have your attention, I need you to eat."

He glanced down at the plate in front of him, then back to her. "What is it?" he asked.

"A burger," she supplied contritely. "What does it look like?" Okay, maybe it did look like something of a mess. She could admit that, if not out loud, at least to herself. "Just eat it. It'll make your stomach stop hurting."

He picked up the bun with the piece of charred meat inside and gave it a sniff before looking back at her. "You're sure about that?"

"Hey," she shrugged. "If you don't like the cooking, you're welcome to do it yourself."

He sat the burger back on the plate and reached out quick enough that she couldn't back away. Before she knew it, he was holding her hands and pulling her towards him. "I didn't mean to sound ungrateful. I'm sorry." He glanced back to the plate. "It looks delicious." As stoic as he normally was, even he couldn't manage to get the words out without a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

"Just eat it." She rolled her eyes at him.

He let her go and took a bite. She could hear him crunching from where she stood and she tried to ignore the sound. Then he looked at her again and gave her a forced, tight smile. "It's very good," he lied unconvincingly. "Could I have a glass of water?"

She brightened considerably. "I've got something better than that. I bought beer."


	8. A kiss to build a dream on

The bitter taste of hops and barley settled on Cas' tongue and he swallowed hard, trying to drive it away. He had never liked the taste of beer, although it was Sam and Dean's drink of choice. He supposed it was an acquired taste and one, so far, he still had not acquired. But one and a half bottles into the twelve pack, it seemed to be helping. He didn't remember alcohol affecting him before. It took a lot of it to cause the light headed sensation he was already experiencing. But then, he hadn't been human.

The voices seemed more distance with the addition of more beer, the struggle to focus on the here and now, not so difficult a task. That was nice. More and more lately, he found that the here and now was where he wanted to be, especially since she was there. He wasn't sure if that had anything to do with his new-found humanity or not. The brothers, or rather Dean in particular, seemed to find comfort in female companionship. Cas had never really seen the draw before. But then he hadn't seen humans in those terms before, hadn't really thought about the differences in males and females.

Now those differences were overbearingly obvious. He found, also, that the more he drank, the more those differences stood out. Like, for instance, he couldn't managed to keep his eyes from drifting away from her face, as lovely as it was, to the swell of cleavage offered by her tight-fitting, v-neck, t-shirt. He was mesmerized by the sway of her hips every time she got up to retrieve another bottle from the fridge.

He wondered if he should say something to her, tell her about the things going through his head. But he hesitated. This was Meg. He was fairly certain telling her how much he wanted to feel the curve of her breast in his palm would not be a good idea. Still, he felt like it was something she should know. She didn't seem to see herself the way he did. It was a shame. She should. She should know how incredibly beautiful she was.

Maybe that was because the Meg everyone saw on the outside was nothing like the Meg that resided on the inside of the vessel she had chosen. But Cas knew the difference. There was only so much of the real soul a vessel could hide.

Her eyes, for one thing, those belonged to the demon behind the girl. Those eyes had seen things no human could ever endure without falling apart, things that couldn't be unseen, things that changed a soul. Those eyes couldn't possibly belong to the young, fresh-faced, innocent-appearing girl she was supposed to be. No, those eyes held a depth that said she'd seen Hell and horrors and she'd made it to the other side.

Then, there was her smile. A smile that always, no matter how amused she was, held at least a hint of sadness and sorrow, pain and regret. It was something he'd never seen before and it was the reason she stood out for him. He'd seen demons, lots of them. But he'd never seen a demon that carried so much guilt over their actions. That touch of self loathing in her smile had saved her life where he was concerned.

It had intrigued him. Could she really be sorry for the things she'd done? Could it be, that like him, she did those things because she was following the orders of a higher being on the food chain? She was an oddity to him at first, like a freak of nature, a demon with a heart. Could that even be possible?

Now that he knew her better, now that he'd spent countless hours listening to her ramble on about her life, her past, the things she'd done, he knew it was all true. And he wanted, more than anything else to help her see herself the way he saw her. Not as a monster, but as a survivor.

That's what she was. She did what she had to do. He wished he could tell her how much strength and courage that took. She might hide from some people behind that witty banter and those bristly thorns of sarcasm, but he knew better. He might just be the only person in the world that truly saw the soul behind the vessel and he found that he really liked that soul.

It was a soul he could relate to, a soul he felt connected to. They were so much alike it was scary. The things he'd done, the things she'd done, the regret and sorrow they both felt ran on nearly parallel lines. She'd tortured souls in hell, listened to them scream and beg for mercy. He'd fallen into the trap of a power struggle with his brothers in heaven that nearly brought about the end of the world. She'd carried out her orders regardless of the cost to her own soul. He'd sunk so low he made deals with devils and purposefully hurt people he called friends all in the name of cementing his power base. She'd killed people, good people, Ellen and Jo, were just a few off the top of his head. He'd killed people, too. Bobby Singer's face flashed through his mind like it often did and his stomach tightened even as the pit of it fell to the floor. He couldn't help but imagine how many other 'Bobby Singers' the Leviathans had destroyed. And he was responsible for every one of them.

He'd allowed his arrogance, his over-inflated ego to override his basic sense of right and wrong. He'd declared himself God, for God's sake. How megalomaniacal was that!

"Hey, Feathers," Meg said, touching his hand which was wrapped around his third bottle of beer. "Don't you go leaving me. I hate to drink alone."

The warmth of her hand against his cold knuckles immediately catapulted the dark thoughts from his head. There she went again, saving him from himself without even realizing what she was doing.

"I'm still here. I was just thinking," he said with a warm smile.

"Thinking about what?" she asked, after taking a drink from her own bottle. Unless he'd lost count, it was her fourth.

He shrugged and took another drink, wincing at the feel of the cold liquid burning all the way down his throat. Maybe that was the draw. Maybe it was a tiny little form of self abuse that caused people to indulge in the drink. "I'd rather not talk about it."

She shrugged right back at him and then there was that smile, the one that made things deep in his chest constrict. "Okay, what would you rather talk about?"

He considered that for a moment. "How about Vermont?"

"We'll leave in the morning. It'll take us a couple of days to get there."

"A couple of days?" he asked, pulling himself up from where he was slumped in his chair.

"Yeah, a few. Two would be my guess. We'll need to stop and sleep on the way," she explained.

"Do we have enough money to get there?"

He'd dropped his free hand to the table in front of him and he had to swallow the surprise he felt when she reached over and placed her hand on top of it. "I've got it covered, Clarence. You just worry about keeping the crazy at bay. I'll get us to the Guru."

He glanced down at their hands and took another long pull from his bottle before swallowing hard, then clearing his throat. He still couldn't bring his eyes away from her hand resting on top of his. This was the second time she'd touched him in the last few minutes and his mind began to race with the implications. He knew all about flirting. Dean had taught him how to read the signs and the signs were all there. The smile, the softness of her eyes, the touching. Could it be that Meg felt the same way about him? Was that even possible? And if it was, what was he supposed to do with that? How should he react? "Meg," he said when he could think of nothing else, "in case I haven't mentioned it lately, I just wanted to say, while I still have a chance-"

"You don't have to say anything," she interrupted before he could go on. She made to pull her hand away, but he grabbed hold of it before she got very far and held it tightly in his.

Her eyes went immediately to their hands, then back to his face and now there was the telltale signs of anger in her face. It was her fall back. He knew that, too. He was expecting the anger. He was ready for it. "Let me go, Castiel," she warned through gritted teeth and with fire flashing in her eyes.

Doing what she asked would be his safest choice. He had to consider the fact that he really, truly needed her for the moment. Driving her away would be a bad idea. And the thoughts running rapid through his mind as he watched her bottom lip quiver slightly would almost certainly drive her away.

But he had never been known for going with his safest option.

He gave her hand a little jerk. The movement caught her off guard enough that it brought her forward and closer to him, like he'd hoped it would. Then before she had a chance to recover, he had her with one arm around her waist and one buried in her hair. He felt like a hunter springing a trap on some helpless prey as he pulled her in close and captured her lips with his.

She struggled at first and his mind was too preoccupied with the feel of her to realize that if she truly wanted to get away she could and would have. Her protests caught him off guard. She hadn't struggled the last time he kissed her. He didn't know what was different now, but he wasn't taking anymore chances with her anger.

He let his hand fall from her waist and tried to disentangle his fingers from her hair. Her hands, which had been laying flat against his chest, now bundled into fists in his shirt and she was the one pulling him closer, refusing the let him go. He quickly gave in and let himself sink into the feel of her lips moving against his.

His stomach flopped when she made a tiny little moaning sound and moved in even closer to him. If she got any closer, she'd be in his lap, not that he minded the idea. He just wasn't sure if she'd be okay with him pulling her there himself.

He was just about to take the chance when her phone rang. They both jumped at the sound and she was off of him and back in her own space before he could think about what to do.

She gave him one last look and he watched as she swallowed hard before getting to her feet and leaving him.

His eyes followed her until she disappeared down the hall. He heard her voice a few seconds later as she answered the ringing phone.

Fear griped him now. He could feel it tightening in his chest. Would she be angry with him? Would she leave him to fight for his sanity alone? If she did, he deserved it. He was expecting it actually. Sooner or later, he was bound to mess this up. He messed everything up. It was just a matter of time.

He finished off his beer and got sluggishly to his feet. He could feel the weight of the voices pulling at him again. He'd known he wouldn't be able to fight them off for long. Soon, they would be stronger than he was. He was losing his hold. He could feel it, like feeling his fingers slipping off of a ledge. The quiet, muffled sound of a thousand voices speaking to him all at once was deafening and growing more so by the second.

He moved quickly to the fridge and grabbed another bottle of beer. It seemed to hold them off before. Maybe it would again. He popped the top and guzzled the thing in one long swallow, closing his eyes against the burning in his throat.

When he opened them again, she was there, leaning against the door jamb with the phone held out in front of her. "That was Dean. He wants us to meet up with him and Sam tomorrow in Buffalo," she said and he almost shrank away from the words. No mocking, no teasing, no name calling. Yep, she was angry. But with him or herself he couldn't begin to fathom. All he knew was that he was the one that was going to pay for it. But then, that was only fitting. It was his fault, after all.

_Oh well_, he mused to himself, _in for a penny..._

He took a step towards her and she thrust her hand out at him roughly. "If you're okay, I'm going to bed. It's been a long day," she said with a snap to her tone that he didn't want to argue with.

"I think we should talk," he started.

She had already turned to go, but she spun back around to face him. "There is nothing to talk about."

"Yes, there is," he insisted.

"NO!" she snapped quickly. "There isn't. It was a mistake, brought on by stress and booze. That's it. End of story."

"It wasn't a mistake, Meg. And I didn't do it because of stress or liquor. I'd do it again, if I thought you'd let me. As a matter of fact, I've been wanting to do it for some time," he said, completely calm as he took another step closer.

"Well, I have no intention of letting you do it again. You have to stop this. We have to stop this," she replied stepping back until her back hit the living room wall behind her. Something crossed her face when she realized she had no where to go and he was steadily advancing on her.

Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, he thought, albeit, a touch belatedly, since he was well within her reach now and the look on her face said she didn't appreciate feeling trapped, pinned in.

By the time all that sank in, it was too late, he was too close to get away and he was certain she was about to hit him. A glance down at her hands showed them clenched into two tight fists. He wondered which one she was about to strike with or whether she'd just go for it and hit him with both.

Still, she hadn't made a move yet. Maybe he had a chance.

"We?" he asked, "We have to stop this?"

She looked more than a little abashed for half a moment, but she recovered quickly and steeled her face again. "I didn't mean we, I meant you. You have to stop. This is insane. You're crazy."

He rocked back as if she had actually used her fists. He was very glad she hadn't decided to attack him, he was too stunned to fend her off.

She was right. How could she possibly want him too? He was crazy, damaged beyond repair and good for absolutely nothing. He'd been a fool to think she might be feeling the same way towards him.

"Wait," she breathed, coming to him and resting her hand on his shoulder to keep him from running, which was exactly what he felt like doing. "I didn't mean it like that. I just meant...you know, we're too different. We have no business even thinking about things like this."

Again, there was that word again, we. He looked into her face, trying to read between the lines, see something that might confirmed for him he wasn't in this all alone. But she gave away nothing outwardly. He opened his mouth, ready to call her on it once again, but before he had a chance to make the words happen, a searing pain tore through his brain, ripping and shredding its way through his consciousness. The voices, so very, very loud suddenly, began to yell, to tease him, taunt him mercilessly.  
He struggled to hold on, to stay with her. He needed to know how she really felt, but the strength of all those voice crying out in unison was too much for him. He was sinking and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

He felt her hand on his shoulder, shaking him in a vain attempt to reach him. It was the last thing he felt before he stopped feeling anything at all.


	9. An Unhappy Renunion

"It's about damn time," Dean Winchester muttered in his normal gruff, gritty voice from under the hood of his precious black 1967 Chevy Impala.

"So sorry," Meg muttered right back as she exited her own late 90's model blue Ford Taurus. "I hate that we kept you waiting."

He gave her a dissatisfied smirk as he popped the hood back into place and started off towards the latest in a long line of no-tell motels he and his brother seemed to call home. "How is he?"

"About the same as he is most of the time, crazy," Meg mumbled after getting an unresponsive Castiel out of the car and taking his hand to lead him towards the room.

After getting inside and greeting Sam with much the same answer to the same question, she deposited her burden in a chair and gave the room a quick once over.

A scarred, dark wood end table sat between two full sized beds and a dresser with a scratched mirror was positioned on the wall at their foot. A table that matched the rest of the furniture with two uncomfortable looking chair sat right under the window. There was a door that she assumed lead into the bathroom and other than that, the room was empty. The carpet was an ugly bronze, dirty and thread bare from a lot of feet trampling it through its many, many years of existence. The walls were a dull gray that she suspected had been white at some point, years and years ago. The orange bedspreads that covered the beds were an eyesore straight from the seventies and as thread bare as the carpet and nearly the same putrid shade. Even the heavy curtains on the large window had the same orange shade and looked as over used as everything else.

But the brothers hadn't been there long. Their unpacked bags were flung just inside the door and there was no trash to indicate the room had been occupied.

"So tell us about this plan," Sam suggested as he took up a spot on the end of one of the beds.

Dean took a similar position on the other one and gave her an expectant look.

"The plan is we're on our way to Vermont to see this dream guru who is supposed to take all the crazy away," she answered, flopping down into the chair at the table beside Cas and giving him a glance to make sure he was alright. It was a habit she'd picked up since taking on her new job as his caretaker. She was always hyper aware of him.

"You think this dream chick is gonna fix him all up?" Dean asked with a touch of doubt and suspicion in his voice. A touch that was almost always there so she ignored it.

She gave him a shrug. "It's the only plan I've got."

"I guess it's better than nothing. He certainly isn't much good to us like he is now."

That irritated her more than she wanted to admit. The comment made it seem like his only concern was that Castiel wasn't any use to them crazy like he was presently. There was hardly any concern for Cas himself. But she was pretty sure she was reading things into it and she ignored it, too.

"He comes and goes, mostly goes, but there are moments when he's the same ole' Castiel we all know and love," Meg offered, again, casting her eyes towards Cas. She almost reached out to brush a stray hair away from his forehead and just managed to stop herself at the last instant when she realized she wasn't sure how her audience would take the gesture.

"And what exactly is going on here?" Dean asked, waving his hand between her and Cas.

She jerked her head around quickly and found his stare with wide, surprised eyes. "What do you mean? I'm taking care of him just like I said I would."

"I just wasn't aware that I was signing him up for the deluxe care taking package. I didn't know googly eyes and pretty little smiles were part of it," he said with more than a little accusation in his tone now.

She wasn't about to ignore that. She got to her feet quickly and planted her hands on her hips. "There are no googly eyes or smiles of any kind. If you think I'm not doing my job the way you'd like you're welcome to take over."

Sam got to his feet and held his hands out at her in what was supposed to be a calming effort. "Now wait a second. He didn't mean it like that."

"Oh, there we go." She smirked in response. "There's the fear. What's a matter, Sammy? Are you afraid I'll take off and leave you to deal with crazy on your own?"

He cast his eyes towards Dean as if his brother might help him out, but the older Winchester just crossed his arms over his chest and pointedly ignored the plea for help.

"That's not it. We just don't want you to think we don't appreciate all you're doing for Cas."

"Right," she nodded sarcastically. "Well, it's almost time for his meds and he needs to take them with food. So I'm going to go get us something to eat. I'm sure you can manage to keep an eye on him for that long."

"He eats?" Dean asked.

"Yeah, thanks to your friend, Chuck, we're both just as human as the two of you. Maybe you could get him to snap out of it long enough to shower and show him how to shave. He needs to do both and I almost took off an ear yesterday when I tried," she suggested before giving the man in question one last long and stalking out of the room.

She made it out of the parking lot and down the street to the first stoplight before the first stirring of panic began to play in the back of her mind. She had no explanation for it. She'd left Cas in perfectly capable hands. If anybody in the world could protect him as well as her it was Sam and Dean. She had no reason to believe that weren't up to the task.

Still the panic was there, just like it had been when she left him to go for food, and it was growing stronger the further away she got from the motel.

She'd meant to take a break, to get away from it all for a moment and let herself indulge in some much needed 'Meg time'. Besides, there were things they needed. She had a running list in her head. Shampoo that didn't make Cas smell like flowers, razors and shaving cream to deal with what was becoming a daily nuisance for her, toothpaste that they were running low on because Cas kept eating it, nail clippers because she was suddenly sprouting a rather deadly set of claws that she'd already scratched him with on accident.

It had been so long since she'd been a human she wasn't prepared to deal with all the little issues that kept popping up unexpectedly.

Like, for instance, if Cas ate in the car, he got carsick not long after. She'd found that out the hard way after deciding their best option was to grab a biscuit at a fast food restaurant that morning while on the road. She'd only barely managed to pull over in time for him to vomit his breakfast outside instead of all over her interior.

And a bottle of aspirin wouldn't go to waste since every time she turned around since waking up human something else happened to cause her head to pound insistently.

She'd just pulled into the parking lot of some large, chain, get-everything-in-one-place store when her phone rang. She almost ignored it. If she hadn't already been ignoring the rapid thumping of her heartbeat and sweat breaking out all over her forehead, she would have.

"What?" she snapped into the receiver after fishing the phone from her pocket and putting it to her ear.

"You have to get back here." Sam told her, without preamble.

"Why?" she spat, already turning the car around. "What's wrong with him? What did you do?"

"We didn't do anything. He just freaked out right after you left. Dean was trying to get him to do what you said, you know, shower and shave. He snapped out of it long enough to realize you weren't here, then he just went nuts on us."

"What do you mean we went nuts?"

"He snatched the towel rack off the wall and hit Dean in the head with it before we got it away from him. He keeps demanding to know what we've done with you," he explained in a near panic.

"Give him the phone," she said.

"I'm not getting that close to him," Sam answered.

"Grow a pair and put him on the phone. He's scared. He needs to know I'm alright."

She heard movement on the other end and a moment later it was Cas on the other end. "Meg? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Clarence." she said and couldn't help the smile that was suddenly cover her face over the sound of his voice. Everything in her seemed to calm instantly the minute they made contact. "I'm on my way back to you now. What's going on?"

"They won't tell me where you are or if you're okay. I knew they had you," he answered.

"Cas, take a deep breath and look at them. That's Sam and Dean. Remember, your friends? They don't have me. I just stepped out for a minute. I'll be right back."

"They're trying to keep you away from me!" he yelled into the phone. "They're trying to hurt you!"

Then it sounded as if the phone hit the floor and she could hear the muffled sound of yelling from all three of them.

_At least he doesn't have any Angel juice_, she thought wearily as she pushed a little harder on the accelerator to speed up her pace.

"Meg?" Dean's voice hissed into the receiver suddenly. "What the hell is going on here?"

"Make a loud noise," she suggested remembering how he seemed to come back to himself before when she overturned the chair.

"We've got him backed into the bathroom right now. I'm not sure startling him is our best move."

"Just trust me."

In the next instant, Dean huffed loudly and there was a loud pop. Then there was silence.

"Dean?" she called into the phone a little frantically.

"It's okay," he answered after a long pause. "He looks okay now. Or at least he's putting the shower curtain rod down so that's a good sign."

When she burst into the room a few moments later, he was back where she left him, though the signs of a struggle were obvious. His hair was ruffled. The white and brown plaid shirt she'd dressed him in that morning was rumbled. Dean was at the sink cleaning the blood from a gash on his forehead. Sam was helping him. The shower curtain lay in a heap in the tub and the rod was on the floor by the door.

"Miss me?" she asked as she shut the door behind her.

Then much to her embarrassment, Cas jumped to his feet and came at her, wrapping her up in his arms and holding her tightly to his chest. "You're okay," he breathed with a sigh of relief.

She jerked out of his embrace and gave him a little a push to distance him from her. "I'm fine. Everything is fine. Stop it."

Dean dropped the bloody washcloth in the sink and stalked towards them purposefully. Before she knew what was happening, Cas was in front of her, shielding her with his body.

"Alright, I want to know right now, what the hell is going on here?!" Dean's voice boomed throughout the room.

"It seems he gets a little upset when I'm not around," Meg mumbled as she tried without success to step around her unwanted protector.

"A little upset?" Sam croaked from Dean's shoulder. "He ripped a towel rack off the wall!"

Dean took a step closer and narrowed his eyes at her. "What have you done to him?"

"What!? I haven't done anything to him." she exclaimed, stepping out whether Cas liked it or not.

"Oh really?" Dean said with another step. "What is it? Some kind of spell? What did you do to turn him into your little minion?" His eyes narrowed even further as he cast them back and forth between the two of them. "Or maybe it wasn't a spell at all. Maybe you just did it the old fashion way."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"You know what it means," he answered.

Cas stepped up beside her and she felt his hand brush against hers as if he were trying to take it, but she flinched away quick enough she hoped the brothers hadn't noticed. "Well, I don't know what it means," he interjected. "But I don't like the way you're looking at her."

"Is that right, Cas? You don't like the way I'm looking at her?" Dean said, without taking his gaze away from Meg.

"No, I don't. She hasn't done anything to me. She's helped me."

"I'll just bet she has," he smirked. "You know this is low, even for you, using his crazy to your advantage so you could seduce him to keep him by your side."

"Whoa! What?" Cas asked, again putting himself between her and Dean, though this time she suspected it was more to protect Dean than her and he was right to worry. Her fingers twitched with a need to slap the sarcastic, accusing look from his face and make him eat his words along with a few teeth.

She dug her nails into her arms, which were crossed over her chest to keep from following through with the move.

She leveled Dean with a cold stare and he returned it with one of his own, throwing in a little judgment and disapproval as well. She countered with indignation and anger. Neither blinked. Neither so much as flinched and the whole scene was given just a touch of amusement as she caught Cas and Sam in her peripheral vision standing at their sides, glancing back and forth between them without a clue as to how to diffuse the situation.

Finally Sam cleared his throat and brought his hand up to rest on Dean's chest. "I think maybe we should just take a deep breath and a few steps back," he suggested in a mild tone meant to bring down the anger level.

Dean ignored him so Meg followed suit not willing to give an inch.

"I said, I think we should all take a beat. This isn't getting us anywhere," he repeated.

Dean broke the stare first to cast his eyes towards his brother then down at the hand on his chest. "She's found some kind of way to use him to her advantage, Sam. I can't just let that go."

"Use him? What exactly is it that you're trying to do?" Meg asked though she let the tension drain from her shoulders as she saw the standoff was over, even if the battle wasn't.

"We just want what's best for him," Sam answered as he ushered Dean backwards towards the beds.

"Really? 'He certainly isn't much use to us like he is now'" she replied throwing Dean's earlier words back at him. "Yeah, that sounds like your only concern is poor crazy Cas."

"Alright," Sam sighed. "I guess you have a point. But you have to understand. We're losing ground out there. The Leviathan are gaining on us quicker than we can stop them. We need help and Cas it the only help we can think of."

"Yeah, we figure he started all this, it's only fitting that he end it," Dean added.

Suddenly Cas tensed and though she couldn't see his face from her vantage point behind him, she knew he'd heard and understood exactly what Dean was saying.

Before she could stop him, he turned and darted out the door.

"Cas, wait!" Dean called as Meg made a move to follow him.

She'd barely taken a step when Dean brushed past her. "Let me go," he said as he paused in the doorway. "I'll find him and bring him back."

"You'd better," she answered, standing down. "He can't take care of himself out there and he's human so he's vulnerable. I'd hate to think about you trying to win your little war if anything happens to your best weapon."


	10. Unforgiven

"Cas?!" Castiel heard Dean's voice calling from outside the car but decided to ignore it. It was more than he could take, having to look at him knowing exactly how he felt about him. He blamed him and that was only fitting because it was all his fault.

He wasn't even able to defend himself. There was no defense. He really was crazy to imagine there might have been just a touch of forgiveness in Dean's voice the last time they'd spoken.

What he hated even more than his own self loathing was Dean's attempt to rest any of the responsibility for any of this on Meg.

She'd done nothing to deserve it. And to accuse her of seducing him was completely absurd. Dean couldn't have been further off base with that one. The way she'd reacted when Cas kissed her was proof that that wasn't her plan.

He hadn't regained enough of his sanity or his courage to talk to her about that night. But it was a conversation he was determined to have. He had to know why he was feeling the things he was feeling when he saw her first thing in the morning, why his stomach gave a little flop every time he said something that made her laugh, why his mind, when it wasn't filled the thousands of voices of his tormenters, seemed to be stuck on an endless loop replaying the memory of their kiss over and over.

He tried to sink down lower in Meg's car's front seat as footsteps approached, but it wasn't enough. The tapping on the window a second later proved that.

He crossed his arms over his chest and adamantly refused to look in Dean's direction, knowing full well and not caring that he looked like a petulant child seconds away from the threat of holding his breath until he got what he wanted.

"So you aren't talking to me now, is that it?" Dean asked, with no intention of going away.

Cas held steady in his tantrum.

"Come on, Cas. I'm sorry. Okay? Are you happy now?"

Finally, he turned his face towards the window. "No, Dean, I'm not happy. How could I be? You're right. Everything is my fault. And I have no idea how to fix it. Maybe it's just better if you left me alone."

"Roll down the window. Or better yet, come back inside. I don't blame you. And you know I'm not going to just leave you alone," Dean replied, stubbornly.

"No," Cas answered, just as stubbornly.

He heard Dean's heavy, frustrated sigh even through the window. Then he watched as Dean shoved his hands into the pockets of his worn blue jeans and stalked back into the hotel room.

If Cas had known the first thing about hot wiring a car, or driving, for that matter, he would have just left. He wished Meg had come out instead. He could have easily talked her into getting them as far away from the Winchesters as they could get. She certainly didn't seem too pleased with Dean or his accusations at the moment, not that he blamed her. In her position in all this, Cas would have been angry, too. After all, she was just trying to help and here he comes thinking the worst of her.

Dean returned a few seconds later with a set of keys in his hand and Cas almost bolted, knowing he was about to have company he didn't want. But that seemed far, far too childish. So he sat there and waited as Dean unlocked the driver's door and got into the car beside him with a very put out expression on his face.

It seemed the only expression Dean ever wore around him these days. Once upon a time, Dean looked at him as an equal, a partner, and even, occasionally as a brother. Cas had finally come to see the Winchesters as something he was a part of. And that was something he'd always wanted, that connection. That feeling like he was part of a family. He'd had that once, with the other angels, that feeling that he was a part of something far bigger than himself. With Sam and Dean, he felt like he'd found that again.

Then Cas went and screwed it all up. He wondered if it was even possible to have Dean look at him like that again, instead of the way he always looked at him now, like just another problem he was being forced to deal with.

"I don't blame you," Dean began heavily. "I just don't know how to deal with you like this."

"Of course you blame me. It's okay. I deserve to be blamed. What I've done, I can never take back or make up for." Cas answered. "All I can say is I'm sorry. I made mistakes, bad choices and everything back fired on me. I didn't mean for anyone to get hurt. I thought I could make it all better." He turned his gaze back out the front window and found an overflowing dumpster behind the motel to focus on. "I'm surprised you can be in the same room with me."

Dean sat up a little straighter and squared his shoulders. "Alright, that's enough. When you're ready to get over your little pity party. Let me know so we can talk."

"This isn't pity, Dean. It's honesty. I unleashed an evil on the world that we have no hope of stopping. I destroyed the world."

"I guess I'm not as ready to give up this fight as you are," Dean replied. "And as for unleashing the Leviathan on the world, okay, you fucked up. But we can figure it out and fix it." He sighed again, "We really do need you out there, Cas. It's bad. Really bad."

"You should apologize to Meg. She's been nothing but helpful since all this started and you weren't very nice to her," Cas said, changing the subject because the previous one was more than he could deal with.

Dean shifted in his seat, turning his body to better face him. "What is going on with you two?" he asked, getting straight to the point in typical Dean fashion.

"Nothing," Cas replied quickly, perhaps a little too quickly and Dean gave him a doubtful look.

"It doesn't sound like nothing."

"Well, it is. There is nothing going on. She takes care of me when I can't. I owe her a lot. That's all," he reiterated, hoping to come off more convincing this time.

It obviously didn't work, because Dean's expression didn't waver even a fraction. "I'm just worried that she might be taking advantage of the situation. This is Meg we're talking about. A demon, remember?"

"She isn't taking advantage of anything and she's not the monster you think she is. She's a kind, descent person who deserves a little appreciation," Cas replied more than a little heatedly.

"Okay, whoa. Now I know there is something going on. You do understand that the only reason she's with you is because she thinks you'll protect her from Crowley, right? She's not taking care of you out of the goodness of this heart you seem to believe she has."

Cas turned to him with narrowed eyes. "There is nothing I can do to protect her from Crowley right now, especially since we're both human. So why do you suppose she didn't just drop me off with you and go her own way?"

Dean dropped his hand against his thigh heavily and huffed in frustration. "Because she knows you won't always be human. At some point, you'll get your juice back and when that happens, she wants you to feel like you owe her something."

"I do owe her something." Cas answered simply. "I owe her a lot." Then he sighed this time and ran his hand through his hair, mussing it up and sending it sticking out in every direction. "I think there might be something wrong with me."

"We know that. That's why you're going to see this medicine woman, to fix you." Dean said in a voice he'd use to talk to a three year old.

"No, I don't mean that. I mean..." he hesitated, not sure how to explain the things he was feelings.

"You mean, what?" Dean prompted.

"There's this fluttering."

"Fluttering?"

"In my stomach, whenever Meg is around there is this fluttering. I don't know how else to explain it. It feels like there are things crawling around in there and I know that's not possible. All the Leviathan are gone now."  
He felt a stab of anger when Dean's expression suddenly shifted from concerned to amused.

"I'm glad you're finding all this so funny," he muttered.

Dean shifted and pulled the smile from his lips purposely. "No, you're right. This isn't funny at all. In fact, now I'm a little a worried. You know you can't trust her, right?"

"I can trust her. I know I can. Actually, she's one of the few people I feel like I can trust right now." Cas tried to explain.

"She's a demon, Cas. Pure and simple. There is no other way to say it. Under any other circumstances you'd be ganking her without even thinking about it."

"That's not true. I've had other opportunities to deal with her and I've never done it. Don't you think there could be a reason for that?"

Dean pulled his hands through his hair and sighed in frustration. "We haven't ever dealt with her before because we've always had a need for her. She's good at that, Cas. It's how she operates. She makes it her business to be needed."

"It isn't like that this time. She isn't staying with me because she has an ulterior motive. Chuck made sure of that before he made her human, too"

"Chuck?" Dean glanced his direction. "Meg mentioned that earlier. How the hell did Chuck manage to make you both human?"

"I have no idea. Clearly, he's more than just the prophet we first imagined him to be."

"More? Like what?"

"I don't know. Not even Angel have the power to do what he did. I can't explain it and I'm not sure I even want to try. Somethings are perhaps better left unexplained." Cas answered sagely.

"Alright, if you say so." Dean grunted. "So tell me exactly how far this thing with Meg has gone. Are you sleeping with her?"

Cas looked down at his hands resting in his lap then back up at his friend. "Yes. It's the only way I can keep the nightmares away and actually sleep."

"I didn't mean sleeping like that. I mean are you having sex with her?"

Cas turned to him quickly with wide eyes. "Of course not, why would you even ask that?"

"The flutterings," Dean smiled with a gesture of his hand towards Cas' stomach. "That is typically where those lead."

"Oh," Cas answered with a nod like he understood though he didn't.

Dean cleared his throat. "Okay, see the flutterings you're feeling mean that you're attracted to her. I know all this is new territory for you since you're suddenly human and all, but my advice is to ignore the flutterings. Meg is not the person you should be fluttering over."

"I kissed her the other night," Cas said quietly as he glanced out the window trying to find anything to look at besides Dean.

"You kissed her?! Did she kiss you back?"

"At first, then she ran away."

"Crap, Cas. This is the last thing we need to deal with right now. Maybe you should just let us take you to the guru. I think you need to get away from her for a while."

"This isn't something for us to deal with. It's between Meg and I and I don't want to go with you and Sam. I want to stay with her. It's where I need to be right now. Besides, she knows how to deal with me. She makes me feel better, normal again." Cas tried to explain.

"I just don't think this is a good idea."

"Well, it isn't your decision to make. It's mine and I'm staying with Meg."

"You aren't exactly in your right mind at the moment. I'm not sure it's a decision you should be making." Dean reminded him.

"I'm perfectly alright at the moment."

"Yeah, what's up with that? I thought Meg said you were more gone than here."

"I"m not sure either," Cas said after giving it a long moments thought. "The only other time this happened was when-"

The words hadn't left his mouth before Meg appeared in the doorway of the hotel room with a startled expression and eyes so black they were like endless glimpses into one's soul.

"Angels!" she cried, shouting out over what had suddenly become a darkened sky, full of rain clouds and distant claps of thunder.

When Cas glanced up to look he realized in alarm it wasn't rain clouds over his head, but wings of several angels drifting toward the hotel in a slow descending mass of feathers, feathers on wings that caused the thunder as they flapped.


	11. Nowhere to Run

Meg scanned the sky as she ran to the car and waited for Dean to exorcise himself from the driver's seat. She shifted impatiently on the balls of her feet.

"I thought you said they couldn't find you now that you're human!" he exclaimed as his dirty, heavy brown hiking boots hit the pavement.

"Yes, Dean, right now is absolutely the time to play the blame game." She bit out sarcastically. "All I know is that they're coming and coming fast. I have to get him out of here," she added rapidly as she gave him a little shove to get him out of her way and slid into the car.

Her hand was on the door, ready to pull it shut when Cas stopped her with a hand on her thigh. "Are we sure it's us the Angels found. Maybe they're here because of Sam and Dean."

"Didn't you make sure the Angels couldn't track them a long time ago? How could they have found them now?" she asked, pulling the door closed before glancing towards him. Her eyes involuntarily moved to his hand, still resting on her jean-covered thigh, but she pulled them away quickly, hoping he didn't notice the distraction his touch had caused her.

Dean had moved to Cas' side of the car now and Cas had his window down in order to talk to him. Meg moved her eyes back and forth between them thinking they were losing a lot of time better spent running as far and fast as they could get. How the Angels found them seemed to her a secondary problem when how they were going to get away felt a lot more urgent.

"Garth knows we're here. Maybe they were tracking him. I'm guessing that now they know you're alive it didn't take them long to figure out we knew about it," Dean suggested, like he was commenting on the weather.

Meg clutched her fists around the padded steering wheel and let her fingernails dig into the leather.

"Perhaps. Can you and Sam handle this if we leave?" Cas asked in concern. Meg hadn't thought of that. Her only thought had been to save Cas. Everyone else could fend for themselves.

"Yeah, get him out of here. But don't go like your running. Just casually drive away. Keep your eyes out to see if you're being followed," Dean instructed needlessly.

"This isn't my first rodeo, Cowboy. Now go away and let us get out of here."

Twenty tension filled minutes later, they were cruising down the interstate keeping pace with all the other cars around them and Meg finally gave herself a moment to take a deep breath. She let it out slowly hoping the movement would draw some of the rigidness from her aching shoulders, but apparently the muscles were still on full alert as they stubbornly ignored her request for relaxation.

"I hope Sam and Dean are alright," Cas said into what was quickly becoming the night.

The oncoming twilight had cast a dusky gray color all around them as the sun made its very last appearance of the day at the horizon.

"I'm sure they're fine. They're the Winchesters," she assured him while giving her shoulders a roll.

"What was that?" Cas asked, eying her closely.

"What was what?"

"That thing you're doing with your arms. What is that? Are you hurt?"

"No, it's fine," she muttered suddenly uncomfortable with the worry for her well being. "My shoulders are hurting but it's fine. I just need to relax."

Cas rose his hand and it was only then that she realized it was still on her thigh. The change in temperate when he moved from her leg was startling and she glanced down at the offending part of her body before glancing back at him then back to the road.

She felt him move again, but the car in front of her was making a move so she continued to keep her attention of the road.

His hand came into view in her peripheral vision and hovered right above her shoulder.

He cleared his throat and the tension in her shoulder increased expeditiously.

"Can I..." he mumbled before clearing his throat again. "Let me help," he said finally in what she suspected was supposed to be confidence but sounded a lot more like unease.

"How are you going to help? You don't have any juice now, remember? Besides, I'm allergic to your brand of juice anyway. It gives me hives."

"You aren't hurt. I don't need to use my grace," he supplied a moment before his hand fell to her shoulder.

If helping was his intention he was failing miserably. The moment his hand came into contact with her every muscle in her body tensed at once and she nearly swerved at the unexpected reaction to his touch.

Slowly, as if he were afraid of alarming her, he eased the hair out of his way and began to gently, gingerly move his fingers.

She didn't relax until he did. Once he stopped staring at her like he was afraid she would elbow him in the mouth any moment, she allowed herself to sink into the feeling of his touch. It was an amazing touch and she wondered where he had learned to do what he was doing. His fingers moved expertly with a skill that peaked her curiosity.

"Where did you learn to do that?" she managed although her tongue had seemed to relax along with the rest of her body and it was something of a challenge to get the words out.

"My wife, the one that found me, she was a massage therapist," he answered quietly.

Meg cut her eyes towards him and gave him a sly smile. "Is that all the little woman taught you? I've been meaning to ask you about that whole marriage thing anyway."

Cas quickly withdrew his hand and dropped it into his lap much to Meg's disappointment. "We didn't have that kind of relationship."

"But you were married?" she returned determined to find out just how far this whole husband and wife thing went. She didn't really want to define the feelings the thought of his wife inspired in her. Mostly because if she were honest she'd have to admit they felt more like jealousy then anything else.

"Yes, but in name only. She took care of me, helped me when I had no memory of who I was. But we hadn't gotten to the point where I was comfortable being intimate."

"And she was okay with that?" Meg asked, not sure she knew what to think of his confession.

"She said she was, yes. She is a very pious woman," he said as if that explained it all.

Meg chortled causing him to shift uncomfortably in his seat. "What was that for?" he asked.

"It just figures. Of course she is very pious. Who else would you wind up married to?"

"What is that supposed to mean?"

She sighed loudly. She hadn't meant to open this can of worms especially not in a container the size of the car with no where to run to if she felt the urge to get away. "It just means that like attracts like, Feathers. That's the way of the world."

"I've always heard that opposites attract," he smirked.

"Oh they do. They just can't stay together."

"Why is that?"

"I don't know," she huffed. "Maybe it's because people need some common ground in order to relate to each other."

He stared out the window for a long time watching the headlights from the other cars grow brighter with the darkening sky. "Are you talking about us?" he asked after so long Meg had thought the subjected dropped.

"What? No, I'm not talking about us. There is no us to talk about," she exclaimed and instantly regretted it when she saw the look her outburst had caused. She reached out and lightly touched his hand. "I didn't mean it like that, Cas. I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I understand. What other way could you have possibly meant it?"

"You know what I'm saying. We just can't do this. We shouldn't even be thinking like that," she tried to diffuse the situation as gently as possible.

"And yet again, there it is, we. Not you, but we. Which leads me to believe that I'm not all alone in this."

Crap, she thought angry at herself for not choosing her words more carefully. Now would be a great time to do that running thing. She knew there was a reason she didn't want to have this conversation in the car. A glance over at him made her suspicious that he might have done this on purpose. He knew she had no place to go as well.

"Cas, I don't want to talk about this. In fact there is nothing to talk about. Right now we have to concentrate on getting you well and stopping the Leviathan. Dean would be the first to tell you that now isn't the time for this."

"So you're saying that there will be a time for this, just not now?" he pressed.

Again, she huffed in frustration. "I didn't say that either."

"I don't know how to not feel the things I'm feeling," he said after a minute.

"Well, I don't know what to tell you. Ignore them, maybe they'll go away," she suggested.

"How long has it been?" he asked, out of the blue.

"How long has what been?"

"How long has it been since you felt like someone cared about you?"

She gave him a glare to let him know that the conversation had taken a turn she didn't appreciate. "The last thing I need is you trying to Dr. Phil me. This is never going to happen. We are never going to happen. And there is nothing else to say about it."

Suddenly, and again, seemingly out of nowhere, his hand landed on her thigh and his voice lowered several octaves when he said, "I seem to remember a time when you weren't so opposed to the idea of you and I being together."

Memories suddenly flooded her consciousness, memories of a kiss in the middle of battle, a kiss of unexpected heat and passion. When the idea of distracting him to get his sword came to her, she expected to feel as if she were kissing a statue. Still, there was always something about the aloof, stoic angel that told her there was a lot more hiding underneath. She had no idea how right she was.

"That time was different. Things were different then," she mumbled as she turned her attention back to the road. She pushed the peddle a little harder and felt guilty for it when she realized she was doing it in hopes of getting far enough away from the Angels to end their conversation.

It was the first time she ever wished for that vacant look on his face or the dullness in his normally sparkling blue eyes. But she had no where else to run and any moment now he was going to ask why things were different now and she would be forced to explain herself.

And sure enough, as if he were reading her mind, he wet his lips, moved a little closer to her and said in a quiet, shaky voice, "Why are things different now?"

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Look, Cas, I already told you I don't want to talk about this. Please just sit back and let me drive."

"If I do that, will you agree to talk about this later when we stop for the night?" he asked.

She opened her mouth to remind him that by the time they stopped for the night, he wouldn't really be him anymore and he certainly wouldn't be in any condition to have a conversation, but she stopped herself, gave him a smile and shook her head. "If you want, Feather. We can talk when we stop for the night. You'll have my undivided attention."


	12. Something

She drove for hours, far longer than she intended to drive, well past the point when a glance at her side told her she was well out of the angel's range. The blank look was back. The glassy-eyed stare right where it normally was and it was the first time she was relieved to see it. It was all becoming too much for her. She was running out of ways of distracting him when he was at himself. It was inevitable. The conversation loomed over her head like some oppressive, impending doom she was not ready to meet.

She felt a little silly for that. It was, after all, just a talk. There was no threat of harm, no underlying motives. Just words, honest, heartfelt words. Words that could change everything for her. Because, like it or not, right at the moment, he was everything for her.

It was a stupid thing to even be discussing at the moment anyway. She felt a little creepy for even having the thoughts that were constantly playing in her head lately. He wasn't himself. She felt as if she were taking advantage of him somehow.

Was it possible that she was manipulating him without realizing it? If she was, it wasn't her intention. Sure, she'd started this whole thing with herself in mind but it hadn't taken long for that to change.

Maybe the problem with having the talk was that she had no idea what she was going to say to him. She just didn't know how she felt. That was what she was telling herself anyway. If she couldn't admit to herself that her feelings were deeper than causal curiosity or normal cardinal lust, how could she admit that to him?

It had been so long since she'd felt the way she felt when he suddenly smiled at her and recognition lit up his face. Her stomach dropped to her shoes, flipped over and slammed into her rapidly beating heart when he reached out to touch her. She wasn't entirely sure she'd ever felt like this before.

She certainly had never felt that way towards a man that deserved to have someone feel that way about them.

It was strange to imagine that he might have any sort of romantic notions towards her. It made her feel unworthy and dirty. He was possibly the greatest man she'd ever known. So upright and strong, commanding and in charge. So impossibly helpless and out of place. So intense and unexpected, and most of all so very, very passionate. There was a burning heat laying right under that surface. She'd seen it. She'd felt it. And she was pretty certain she was the only other being in the world that knew what he was truly capable of.

But none of that mattered. The fact was Castiel had changed the game between them when he brought feelings into play. She'd have been perfectly happy to shag his feathers off before. Now she knew it meant something to him. It was evident every time he looked at her and actually saw her. He was no good at hiding his emotions. They played over his face like a movie straight out of Hollywood. Most people would call him stoic, say she was seeing things that weren't there, but she knew it was true.

It was something she called the Castiel delayed reaction. He had a way of taking everything in at once then slowing it all down and putting it together in his mind. That was when she loved to watch him. She liked seeing the thoughts cross through his expressive eyes as he sussed out situations silently.

She suddenly slammed her hands against the steering wheel in way of chastising herself for her brain's betrayal. The noise was enough to stir her companion and she cast a glance in his direction to acknowledge him. And there was that smile and there went her heart beating like it was trying to break free, and there went her stomach soaring to her feet then bouncing back up again hard enough to choke her.

"Where are we?" he asked as he wiped the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hand. And there was that boyish charm that was never that far away from him.

"Watertown, New York."

"How close are we to Swanton?"

"I don't know really. I just started driving in this direction and never stopped. I guess we could pull in for the night somewhere." she suggested. "Are you hungry?"

His stomach gave a loud groan at that moment to answer for him in case he couldn't. He looked down with a wiry smile. "I guess I am."

"Me too. I saw a sign a little ways back we'll grab a bite and find somewhere to sleep for the night," she said, flipping on her blinker and making to change lanes and leave the interstate.

"You seem awfully...present," she added.

"Are you disappointed?" he asked, and she could feel his eyes boring into her.

"No, just surprised." It was a lie. She had been counting on him being down for the count by the time they stopped for the night. But then, her paranoia was never far away and she began to wonder if perhaps they'd been followed after all. "And a little curious about why you're so present."

He ran a hand through his hair before rubbing his eyes again. "I don't know. It seems that since Chuck did whatever he did, it's easier for me to quiet the things running around in my head, if that makes sense."

"Not even a little bit. You've never said much about where you go or what happens when you space out on me. Care to share?" She was hedging now. It was a desperate attempt and she was sure he'd recognize it for what it was immediately.

"No, I don't care to share. I don't want to talk about that at all. It's quiet now and I can think. I just want to enjoy it for a minute." He answered, cutting the subject off abruptly.

"Okay, I'll just be quiet then and let you think," she shrugged.

"I didn't mean it like that. I didn't say I wanted you to be quiet. I'm glad they are being quiet. Listening to you speak is never a burden."

She looked at him as they pulled up to a stoplight and tried to give him her best stern look. "You have to stop saying things like that. Hell, you need to stop thinking things like that."

"Why?" was his simple question and she opened her mouth and closed it several times as she tried to come up with an answer that sounded reasonable.

"Look, this just isn't in my wheel-house, okay? I'm not cut out for it," she settled on finally.

"I don't understand," he said.

"Of course you don't," she huffed.

"What aren't you cut out for?"

"Feelings," she said abruptly and little bit louder than she'd intended.

"You have feelings for me?" he asked, completely ignoring her outburst.

"I thought that was what all this was about."

"It is," he answered with a barely suppressed smiled. "I just never thought you'd admit it."

"What? I didn't admit anything. I told you I don't do feelings. Its how I've managed to stay alive as long as I have."

"You use that as an excuse a lot, being on the run from Crowley. But what about all the time before that? Did you 'do' feelings then?"

"An excuse?! You have no idea what it's like to be scared all the time, constantly looking over your shoulder, constantly worried that any minute you'll run out of room to move," she yelled.

"You are right. I don't know what it's like to live on the run the way you have. But you can't tell me you truly believe that being on your own is safer than being with someone who cares about you, someone who is looking out for you, too."

"Okay, I'll admit that. It would be nice. But there is no one I can trust like that."

He reached out slowly as if he were silently asking for permission and put his hand back on her thigh. She nearly swerved off the road when she looked down at it. "You can trust me. I would never betray you, not to Crowley or anyone else, for that matter." He told her with every bit of sincerity and earnestness she'd ever seen him use.

She shook her head because her eyes were suddenly stinging and she didn't know why. "Why not? I'm a demon. Killing things like me is what you do. Why would you put yourself out there for me like that? What have I ever done to deserve that from you?"

"I don't know. I can't explain how I feel. I just know that it's true. Maybe it's because of the way you're taking care of me now. At least that's what I keep telling myself, but if I'm really being honest about it, I think there has always been something..." he trailed off as if he didn't know how to finish the sentence. Then he looked over at her, grabbing her attention as soon as she pulled into the parking place she'd spotted outside of some greasy diner.

There was something in his expression. He seemed shy, like a schoolboy working up the nerve to talk to the prettiest girl in class. "I'm pretty sure that something has always bee there for you, too," he said, but intonation made it more of a question than a statement.

She turned off the motor and flipped off the headlights at the same time. Then she pocketed the keys before picking up his hand and physically removing it from her leg. "Let's eat. I'm starving," was all she said before she got out of the car and went inside the restaurant.


	13. Here and Now

_ His chest heaved against his ribcage as he fought to draw a searing hot breath into his lungs. He ran a hand across his forehead to wipe away the newest layer of sweat that had gathered there. His sleeve was damp from all the previous times he'd done the same thing. The air was so heavy if felt as if he were trudging through a dense fog as he tried to keep his feet moving in the right direction._

_ Castiel wasn't even sure what direction that was, he only knew that he could hear her. It was a distant, muffled sound, but he'd recognize it anywhere. It was Meg and she was in pain._

_ He stumbled on something at his feet and he didn't have the courage to look down to see what it was. It was enough that every few steps he took brought yet another inky, black, toothy maw springing from the walls on either side of him._

_ He was in a passageway of some sort. Muted, red hued light throbbed all around him as if an alarm had been tripped by something. The walls, floors and ceiling were metal, bringing to mind an underground bunker. The thickness of the fog,the faces in the walls, the scorching temperature, it was all baring down on him, like a huge foot on his back pressing him down harder and harder with each step. And the sound of her screams continued to ring out, reverberating off the walls and echoing in his head._

_ They were growing louder and he wasn't sure if it was because she was in more pain or if he were getting closer. He prayed with everything inside him it was the later._

_ This was his fault. The Leviathan had finally come upon the one thing they could use against him, the one thing that just might break him. It was her and they knew it and now there were never going to stop using her against him._

_ It was hard to tell reality from this nightmare place he often found himself in. It wasn't always like this. Sometimes it looked exactly like any of the mundane, ordinary looking motel rooms he called home. Other times it was outdoors, in a darkened haunted woods with the trees coming to life around him, or a breezy meadow with the wind blowing pleasantly through the greenest grass he'd even seen while birds sang in the cloudless sky and the sun bathed as far as the eye could see in its warmth._

_ The one thing that stayed the same no matter where he found himself was that she was always there. Her screams always rang out in the distance and the black maw of teeth always followed him._

_ Then there were the times when he simply wasn't anywhere at all. Nothing but blackness surrounded him, blanketed him in its cold, emptiness and it was her voice that filled his mind, taunting him, teasing him with truths he didn't want to face. Truths he couldn't yet face._

_ Another creature leaped from the wall coming so close to his face he could feel its breath against his cheek. It called his name in a breathy hiss and laughed as its voice echoed eerily._

_ He pressed on, ignoring the apparition and concentrating on her desperate sounding cries for help. He couldn't image what could possibly be making her make that noise. This was Meg. Whatever was happening to her had to be unimaginable. She wasn't the type to cry wolf. She wasn't the type to cry, period. It was a gut-wrenching sound, a noise his brain could barely process. It sounded like her, yet the sound itself seemed foreign in her voice. She simply didn't break._

_ He started to move faster as his mind began to conjure up images his brain couldn't process. He had to get to her. He was becoming frantic now, slamming his shoulders against every door he came to, hoping each one would lead to her._

_ Her screams were deafening. She was close. She had to be behind one of these doors. He had to save her. He had to get to her._

_ Then suddenly the screams stopped and silence rang out making his stomach clench so tightly he almost fell to his knees. There was only one thing he could imagine that would make the screaming stop like that. Only one possibility._

_ He staggered at the thought and only managed to stop himself from falling by sticking a hand out against the wall. Just as it made contact, one of the faces sprang to life and latched on to it, dragging him into its icy depths._

* * *

He woke with a start and the first thing he noticed were the sweat drenched sheets beneath him. His hair was plastered to his forehead and he snatched his hand through it to displace it. His heart was pounding in his chest as he reached out to the empty spot on the bed next to him.

He wasn't even certain how he'd come to be where he was. The last he could recall, he'd been riding in the car after having left the diner where they'd stopped for dinner.

A glance down told him she'd gotten him to the motel, changed his clothes and tucked him into bed since then. But where was she now?

The dream came blaring back at him. The memory of the sound of her screams and then the abrupt absence of them caused a panic to rip through him as he sprang to his feet.

He had to find her. He had to know she was alright.

He heard her quiet gasp a moment after his feet hit the floor and he turned quickly towards the noise.

She had been sitting in a chair in the corner of the room. It was facing the window and the curtain was pulled back just slightly offering her a view of the parking lot of the motel. Now she was on her feet as well, facing him and looking startled and concerned.

He must have looked like a madman, he thought as he remembered his ruffled hair and tried to imagine it paired with what had to have been terrified frenzy written all over his face. His red flannel pajama pants were rumpled and damp as was the thin white t-shirt covering his chest.

She, on the other hand, was breathtaking. She stood in the half light, part of her lit up from the streetlamp outside the window, while the other was swallowed up by the darkness of the room. The sleeves of her red flannel pajama top hung low enough that her hands were completely covered by the cuffs while the hem danced enticingly around her thighs. The pale skin that surrounded it was milky, creamy and nearly ghostly white in the bad lighting. Her hair wasn't pulled back like it normally was at the hospital. Now it framed her face and fell to her shoulders in a cascade of waves.

Something about the scene brought to mind one of the old black and white movies she was so fond of. Nothing appeared colorized except for the red in her shirt and the matching color on her lips.

The only sound in the room was the small fan she'd set up on the dresser. It whirled away, filling the space between them until finally she mustered a half smile and said, "Bad dream?" as she took a cautious step toward him.

His eyes surveyed her shamelessly as he searched out anything amiss. He had to know she was unharmed.

He took a step in her direction as he realized it wasn't enough. His hands twitched to feel for themselves that she was alive and well. It was dangerous. He knew that. She'd done nothing but rebuff him for days now. He shouldn't be moving steadily closer to her. He shouldn't be allowing the itching in his fingertips to drive him forward.

But he was and the moment he was close enough, he reached out and grabbed her by the shoulders. He felt like an unstoppable force and whether it was right or wrong didn't matter at all to him in that moment. All he cared about was making sure she was safe.

He pulled her into him with such force that she gasped and the soft puff of breath that blew across his cheeks as he stared down at her smelled of sweet alcohol.

She squirmed and did her best to avoid his stare, though with him so close it was a losing battle. "I think I've mentioned before, Feathers, I'm not big on being grabbed. Its a demon thing, you understand."

"Normally," he huffed as he continued to bare down on her. "I love the sound of your voice. It soothes me. But right now I really wish you would shut up."

His lips were covering hers before she had a chance to pull away. He pulled her in, greedily drinking in the knowledge that she really was okay. She was right there in his arms, safe and secure and nothing would get to her as long as he was capable of stopping it.

And at the moment he felt capable of taking on anything that came at him if it meant protecting her, Angels, Demons or even things he'd never before imagined.

He clutched her as reality hit him with the sudden force of a hurricane. He was in love with her. He'd never really put the pieces together before in that way. But there it was and now that the idea was planted in his mind, it wasn't going anywhere. It all made sense and more than that, it all felt right.

Her hands were buried in his hair and they flexed involuntarily as he deepened the kiss further still, parting her lips and delving into the dark recesses of her mouth with an expertize he had no idea he possessed.

Maybe, he thought musingly, he was a natural at this. Dean would be so proud.

The thought of his friend caused his chest to tighten. He would never approve of this. He would never understand how Cas felt about the demon in his arms. This would be yet another thing that would come between them. And he was just beginning to believe that their friendship might have a chance at being salvaged. This would end it for sure. There was no question in Cas' mind about that. Dean had made his feelings perfectly clear.

No, he would make him see. Cas would get him to understand. He had to. They were the two most important people in the world to him.

Besides if he could forgive Sam for all the things he'd done, how could he not do the same for him? He would have, at one time. Cas believed that. He remembered a time when he felt like he was really a part of the Winchester family.

He quickly cut off that line of thinking and threw yet another silent curse towards the Leviathan that constantly occupied his mind for trying to pull him back under. But he knew that game too well. He was on to them. As long as he didn't dwell on his past he could keep hold of his present. And right at the moment with Meg's hands buried in his hair and her lips dancing so deliciously under his, the present was commanding his undivided attention.

They give one last stab to his resolve as a wave of self doubt washed over him strong enough that he almost stumbled. He'd never actually done this before. Oh, he knew all the basics, how everything worked and such, but he'd never participated before. He wondered if she was aware of that fact. He wondered if it would matter to her if she did. Would she change her mind?

Meg helped him in his fight this time when one of her hands dropped from his and snaked its way under his t-shirt. The other hand quickly followed suit and in a matter of heartbeats she had the thing off and on the floor behind her.

She covered his chest with her palms, fingers splayed as she took a moment to just feel him. He watched her intently as her eyes followed her hands. Her touch was caressing, lingering. If he didn't know she would kill him for even thinking it, he might have added tender.

When she had her fill, she snaked her arms back around his shoulders and once again buried her hands in his hair as she pulled him back in for a kiss.

"You're sure you're up for this?" she whispered into his ear after leaving a trail of moist heat across his jaw with her tongue.

He pulled her hips in tightly against his, letting the evidence of his arousal speak for itself.

He wasn't sure how she did it but suddenly her hand was surrounding that evidence and she gave him a squeeze that caused him to gasp out loud. "I wasn't concerned about that, Clarence. I figured you had that covered. I was thinking about your habit of taking sudden leaves of absence. I wouldn't be nice to get a girl all worked up then exit the party."

He was having a hard time concentrating on what she was saying with her one hand still wrapped firmly around him and her other hand playing with the hair on the nape of his neck. "I can promise you I'm completely here and I'm not going anywhere." He managed to bite out.

"How?" she asked, glancing towards the window like she expected to see an entire garrison of Angels standing there.

"I'll explain later," he answered, grabbing her chin and pulling her face back to him. "Right now, I want my shirt back."

Her eyes fell to her chest then came back to his face with a smile. "Then take it," she challenged.

He did just that, taking the shirt by both lapels and giving them a snatch that sent buttons flying in all directions.

"Oh this is going to be fun," she smirked as she looked down at the useless garment. Then she dropped her arms and let it fall from her shoulders.

He missed the opportunity to agree with her when his eyes fell to her chest and all his attention was immediately sucked in. They weren't the first pair of breasts he'd ever seen. Far from it. It wasn't even the breasts themselves that commanded his attention so completely. It was the scar, a nasty looking thing that ran in twin straight lines across her stomach. It was the scar she no doubt received when he threw her into a ring of Angel's Fire and used her as a bridge in his escape. He reached out his hand and traced the lines with his fingers. This was his fault. He had done that. And it wasn't because of any Leviathan or other ugly thing controlling him. It was all him.

Growing impatient with his stare or maybe she was afraid she was losing him, she grabbed his hand from her stomach and brought it up to cover her breast. "It goes here. That doesn't matter. It was a different lifetime ago. Besides you aren't the bad guy in that tale. I am and you did what you had to do to save yourself. Now enough with the angst."

He found her eyes with his and gave her a smile. "How do you always seem to know just what to say and when to say it?"

She shrugged and it caused her breast in jump in his palm which he was still holding a touch awkwardly. "It's a gift. And believe me it only works on you. Most people would say I have a knack for the opposite."

His eyes were searching her face as if he were trying to dissect her. "Why is that?"

"Cas," she smirked as she let her eyes fall to his hand. "Right now I really wish you would shut up."

He pulled her back into him with purposeful determination and once again covered her mouth with his.

He was growing more and more obsessed with her taste by the second. He let his tongue sweep across the roof of her mouth and basked in the tiny, little groan she made as a result.

She was practically crawling up his body and he took the bait, raising her off her feet. Her legs circled his waist immediately and her breasts pressed forcefully into his chest making it hard to draw a breath, or maybe that was because of her tongue whirling around the ridges of his ear.

He sat her down on the edge of the bed and began to urge her backwards. She moved along with him until they were both in the center of the bed and he was kneeling over her.

He left her mouth and imitated the way she had used her tongue on his jaw by running his down the column of her throat, over her collarbone and into the valley between her breasts. He paused there for a moment, enjoying the feel of her silky skin against his mouth and the salty taste against his tongue.

She arched her back into him and let out a groan from down deep in her throat. The sound empowered him, chasing away any lingering doubts he still might have had. So it was with confidence that he reached up and gently cupped her breast in his hand. He held it there for a moment, testing its weight in his palm, marveling at its milkiness, its flawless perfection. It wasn't until she began to squirm again that he lowered his head and took the nipple between his lips.

Then he set to work learning exactly how and where she liked to be touch. It was a slow, torturous lesson, but worth every bit of effort every time he did something to make her gasp or better yet, groan. Once, while he was carefully examining the back of her knee, she moaned his name. Now he was determined to make her do it again. He had witnessed Angels singing on High, yet it didn't compare to hearing her say his name like that. It was almost as good as the way she sank her hands into his hair and hissed when he racked his teeth over her hipbone.

He had long since decided he was going to spend the rest of his existence working to keep her with him like this. This was a drug, the most powerful one he'd ever imagined. He was already an addict.

And it wasn't the sex he was addicted to. It was her. It was having the most amazing, capable, tough as nails woman he'd ever meet writhing in his arms and groaning his name.

She jumped on the moment of weakness his revelry afforded her and flipped them so quickly he didn't have time to react.

The look on her face as she towered over him said it was time for payback. He dropped his head to the mattress and resigned himself to his fate.

By the time she finished her careful, languorous trek down his body and back up again, he was completely bare and he was on fire. Every nerve ending inside him buzzed with sensory overload. She was practiced, skillful and it showed as she tormented him with her tongue, teeth and hands.

The battle waged on for hours, each gaining and losing the upper hand more times than either of them could keep count of, neither caring who was winning or losing.

By the end of the war all that was left was a tangle of arms and legs, sweat covered bodies and an exhaustion so complete all he could do was concentrate on keeping his heart from escaping the cage of his chest.

She had fared no better, laying limply at his side with her head resting on his chest while she dragged in one ragged, labored breath after another.

Several moments passed as they each tried to regather their strength.

"Are you going to tell me how you managed to fight off the crazy for so long without the Guru's help?" she asked, in what was almost a steady voice.

He envied her that as his chest still heaved and fought for air. He swallowed and cleared his throat, wincing at the scratchiness his last final call of her name to Heaven's had caused.

"I'm not fighting them off," he tried to explain. "I'm pushing them away. As long as I can stay in front of the things chasing me, I'll be fine."

She raised her head and shifted so she could look up at him. "What does that mean?"

He took her hands in his and grabbed her gaze with his own. "It means that as long as I can stay here with you in the present, I can keep the past from grabbing hold of me. Earlier when we talked, you seemed pretty set against this. What made you change your mind?" he asked to change the subject.

"You caught me in a good mood," she smirked. "Besides, it wasn't like we didn't both see this coming. And," she drew out the word slowly. "I've always been a sucker for a man that knows what he wants and takes it."

His hand flexed where it rested on her hip. "Trust me, I know exactly what I want," he assured her.

"So as long as I can keep your roaming little brain focused on the here and now, you can keep the crazy away?" she asked as she began to snake her way towards his lips.

"It seems so," he answered.

"Well, then I guess its my duty as your nurse to do everything I can to keep you attention."


	14. Clarence

"Why do you call me Clarence?" he asked out of blue as they lay in a crumpled heap in the middle of the stark hotel room's king size bed.

It wasn't the first time he'd asked her that. But she determined, as she jumped up and grabbed her laptop computer from her bag, it would be the last time.

George Bailey's life played out in front of them for the next few hours. The light from the screen was the only source in the room and it cast eerie shadows across the wall behind them. They were still in a heap in the middle of the bed, but it was a more organized one now. He was on his back with one hand behind his head. His other rested on the curve of her hip. She was beside him, one leg draped over his and her head resting in the crook of his shoulder while she idly traced patterns on his chest with her nail. A single thin sheet covered them while the fan on the dresser, set to oscillate, blew across them periodically.

Cas was completely engrossed. In fact she wasn't sure she'd ever seen him give anything such total command of his attention. Usually there was a part of him that was and always would be a solider, a tiny piece that was forever diligently on alert. But at the moment, if that part of him was still functioning he was hiding it well. She'd never seen him more relaxed, more at ease.

As the movie played on, she watched his face. If this was how he reacted to 'It's a Wonderful Life', she idly wondered what 'The Wizard of Oz' would do to him, or maybe even 'Gone With the Wind'. 'Forrest Gump' perhaps?

She had centuries worth of experience while he was more or less just starting out. And she wanted to be the one to show him. She wanted to be the one to watch him see things for the first time, experience things for the first time.

She stopped that line of thought before it made it too far. When all this started, she'd just been sitting at the window berating herself for letting her life turn into some kind of angst-filled soap opera. This wasn't her. She didn't deal with this kind of shit. This was Sam's game. She and Dean had both learned a long time ago that sitting around talking about your feelings and dealing with your issues never lead to anywhere good.

She was ready to give up and give into him.

She was done. She knew what she wanted and she was damn well going to get it. To hell with all this trying to do the right thing crap. She was what she was, and that was a demon. She didn't play games and act coy. She bull dozed right into things with the biggest hammer she could find.

So to hell with all the worrying and wondering, the contemplating and nail biting. Consequences be damned. She'd never been one to gamble on the future anyway. She never expected to make it there.

But now, lying in his arms in the middle of the night, watching the shadows and emotions play across his handsome face, she wanted to make it there. It was the first time in a long time that was true. She'd been ready to give up this whole life on the run and accept whatever consequences came with no longer running. She was tired, or she had been before a rumor began tickling her ear about an Angel coming back from the dead.

She wanted to say that the only reason she went looking was that she saw an angle in it. That's what she kept telling herself anyway. She knew the real reason. The moment she first saw Castiel she was captivated, enthralled. He was the first Angel that she'd ever seen. The pure, Godly power of him had done things to her, awoke things inside her she thought long dead. She would be the first to admit that power turned her on and she would also admit that she had never, ever in her existence seen anything as powerful as Castiel that first time she saw him.

He was standing in the middle of the room, held there by a ring of Holy fire. When she came in, Lucifer was taunting him. She remembered seeing the fury and rage on his face, thinly veiled by a layer of calm, control. But it was there, that tumultuous, fiery rage. It was the very thing that made it impossible for her to stop thinking about him.

She kept up after that, honing in on any news of him or the Winchesters. After all, she figured, where one was, the other was never that far behind.

She'd been heart broken by the news that he'd teamed up with Crowley. She'd always thought more of him than that and she wondered what had happened to make that seem like an option for him. It wouldn't have been for the Angel she first met.

She'd been even more heartbroken over the news of his death, although a tiny piece of her never really believed it was true. She'd even gone to the lake where she heard it happened, looking for clues that he might have pulled through.

And she still couldn't believe how happy she'd been when she found him again, sitting with a dumbstruck look on his face in the front seat of Dean's car. Or how happy she'd been when she saw Dean drag that damned trench coat out of his trunk and hand it to him. Something about the whole thing hadn't seemed real to her until the ugly, rumbled, cheap piece of clothing was back where it belonged.

She had the thing even now. She'd hung on to it and she honestly had no idea why.

She was so lost in thoughts of the past, it startled her when the phone sounded out from the bedside table.

She laid a quick kiss to his chest and climbed off the bed to answer it, dragging the sheet along with her much to his protest.

"Hello?" she answered when she finally managed to get to her feet and snatch the sheet away from him.

"I think we know why the Angels were able to find you." Dean answered without preamble and instantly her mood took a dive.

She cast her eyes towards Castiel's naked form as she swallowed hard and answered. "Why is that?"

"You said Chuck made you both human, right?" he questioned. His tone was crisp and abbreviated.

"Yes, what are you getting at?"

"We need to meet. Where are you?"

She glanced back to Castiel more in alarm now. "Why do we need to meet? What's going on?"

"We have Hex bags for you. I'm sure once the Angels got wind of what happened to you, they figured out they could track you now." he explained impatiently.

"Shit! I didn't think about Hex bags," she cursed herself. "We're in Watertown, New York. How far away are you?"

"Half a day, give or take."

"Should we wait here or come to meet you?" She was trying to think through both options to find the best one for herself when he interrupted her.

"We'll come to you. I have a few things I need to sort out with Cas in person. How is he?"

"Not up for a replay of his greatest fuck ups if that's what this is about?" she hissed in a quiet voice so Castiel wouldn't hear her as she slipped into the bathroom and closed the door behind her.

"It isn't and even if it was, it's not your business."

"Yes, actually, it is my business. He's holding on right now. He's better. I intent for him to stay that way until I can get him fixed." she answered.

"Look here, Lady!" Dean exclaimed, but the rest of his sentence was cut off and replaced by the sound of rustling.

"Meg?" Sam's voice asked a moment later.

"Sam, if he's coming here to cause trouble with Cas, we'll be long gone by the time you get here." she warned, earnestly. She'd rather take her chances with making her own hex bags than risk losing Cas to the darkness of his mind again.

"He won't cause trouble. You have my word. You said he was better?"

"Yeah, right as rain most of the time. In fact right now he's watching 'It's a wonderful life'."

"How's that happening?" Sam wanted to know.

"He says as long as he doesn't dwell on the past he can stay in the present, if that makes sense to you. I didn't question it too much. I'm just glad I'm not having to take care of him right now. All that being helpful and caring can really drag a girl down."

He paused for a moment and all she could hear was Dean's muffled voice in the background. "Dean says if you're going to make him watch something like that you have to make him watch 'Rambo' next." Sam translated.

"Tell him that Cas isn't a child we're co-parenting and he should mind his own business."

"You might want to ward the room you're staying in just to be safe until we get there." he reminded her needlessly. She was already in the process of getting things together to do that.

After agreeing to still be in town the next day and signing off with them, she gathered up her supplies and went back to the outer room.

"I understand now," he said, sitting up on the side of the bed.

"You understand what?" she asked as she set her things down on the table in the corner.

"I understand why you call me Clarence. But I can assure you, I've had my wings for quite some time and it didn't take me more than one try to get them," he answered earnestly as he puffed out his chest in male vanity.

She doubled over in laughter so hard there was nothing she could do to stop it. She couldn't help but compare him to a little boy who's pride had been hurt.

He watched her for a moment with his brow crinkled as he tried to figure her out since he hadn't been attempting to make a joke.

"You don't believe me?" he asked finally when he could come up with nothing else.

She gathered herself as best as could, though a few giggles still managed to sneak past her resolve, and crawled onto the bed behind him. Then she wrapped her arms around him and whispered in his ear, "Oh, no I believe you. I'm betting you were the mightiest of all the Angels in Heaven."

He pulled away from her so quickly she nearly fell flat on her face.

"What's wrong with you?" she asked after another look at him showed signs of anger around the edges of his eyes.

"Nothing, We should get to work on the wards for the room," he hedged as he grabbed his pants from the floor and slid into them.

"So you were listening in to my phone call?" she asked, gathering herself and her sheet and climbing from the bed.

"I wasn't listening, I just overheard. Besides, it was Sam and Dean. I didn't think it would matter if I listened in."

She tucked the edge of her sheet around her and moved past him to the table where she'd left her tools and began to sort everything out. He followed and stoically went about taking up the small pocket knife she laid out. Then he pricked his finger with the tip of the blade and went to work artfully drawing out the sigils they needed to keep them safe.

His back was turned to her and she spent more time than she should have watching his muscles flex with the movement of his arm.

"Is something wrong with the way I'm doing this?" he asked without turning around or even pausing in his work.

"No, it's fine," she muttered at his still edgy tone.

She didn't know what had happened to ruffle his feathers but she didn't remember 'It a wonderful life' ever leaving a bad taste in her mouth like it obviously had his.

She thought she should have been more angry over the fact that he listened to her phone call. It seemed like, from anyone else, she would have seen that as an invasion of privacy, but with him, it was different. She had nothing to hide from him, first off. That was something new for her. Normally she played things pretty close to the vest, not trusting the people around her.

But somehow, over the past few months, it seemed to her that her view of the world had changed. Always before she saw things as her against the world. Now, it was them. He had managed to work his way inside her tiny bubble of personal survival instinct. It made things a lot harder she realized. Although, when he was fully at himself she wouldn't want anyone else in the world fighting by her side. No matter what kind of uglies they faced, she was pretty sure, between the two of them, they would win, every time.

"Did you mean what you said on the phone?" he asked, after a silence had settled over them so deep it startled her to hear his voice break through it.

He was just about to put his hand against the first sigil to activate it. She wondered if he knew how humans had to do it. It was different for them, collecting power into their already magical forms wasn't a trick. Forcing it into a mundane vessel like a human body required a knack.

"You're going to have to be more specific?" she said as his hand hit the middle of the magical symbol and nothing happened.

He turned towards it himself and gave it a curious glance before turning back to her and trying again.

"Do I drag you down?" He asked in a voice that was as cold as ice.

"Of course not. I never said that," she said, turning to her own symbol on the opposite wall.

She gathered as much force as she could inside her vessel. It was something she was practiced at when she was a human. Then she put her hand in the middle of the sigil and pushed the energy out and away from her.  
The symbol glowed with a faint blue light for a moment before it faded out once again.

"You did say that," he rebutted. "Just now on the phone. I understand how you could see all this as a burden to you." He tried once again to activate the sigil and still nothing happened. She could see the frustration growing on his face.

"You have to draw it in. Force it. It doesn't come as easy to humans," she tried to explain patiently.

"I know what I'm doing!" he hissed at her. "I'm not helpless!" The moment the words were out of his mouth the symbol lit up with a brilliant sapphire blue flame.

They both stared at it until the light finally began to fade, an act that took much longer than Meg's had.

"I never said you didn't know what you were doing." She told him as they both found new places on opposite walls and started drawing the symbol all over again. "I was just trying to help."

"Well, right now, I don't need your help so I won't be dragging you down. I'll be fine," he spat over his shoulder at her.

"Damn it, you know I didn't mean that."

She heard him stop and turn towards her so she did the same. "No, I don't know that. I don't know anything and since you won't talk to me I have to draw my own conclusions."

"And what conclusions have you drawn? Please enlighten me." she said, dropping her hand to her hip.

He turned back to his work, so she did the same while she waited for him to answer her.

"I think you have an agenda here. I don't think you're just taking care of me out of the goodness of your heart." he muttered quietly.

She finished her symbol and ignored him for long enough to power it up. Once it was done she turned back to him and watched as he put the final touches on his own. "And why is that? Because I was a demon so surely there couldn't be any goodness in my heart to begin with?"

He was silent and still for a long time, long enough for her to wonder if he were just ignoring her now.

Then he raised his hand and placed it in the center of his finished sigil and once again it blared to life with a sapphire fire much brighter than hers had been. "I never said that." he finally answered as he turned to her slowly.

"You didn't have to. I know how you think," she spat back at him.

Neither of them said anything as they went about putting bandages over there pierced fingertips.

They were standing shoulder to shoulder at the table so when he turned to her, he towered over her almost menacingly. "The things in my mind," he began, in a soft distant voice. "they put things in my head. They make me doubt things, everything, actually." He paused as he wet his dry lips. "So I really need to know..." he paused again, this time with his eyes locked into hers. "Why are you here with me?"

She broke his intense gaze and focused on the wall behind him. She just couldn't take those eyes boring into hers with that pleading, lost expression in them anymore. "I don't know." She told him and it was the truth. She didn't know why she was still there with him. She could have left a long time ago. It would have been a safer option for her. She could have dropped him with the boys and taken off to find much greener, more secure pastures. But she hadn't and in all honesty, she didn't know why.

His face turned instantly dejected and he started to step away from her, but she just couldn't let him go like that. She reached out and grabbed his arm to stop him. "I don't know why I'm still here. But I can tell you that there is nowhere I'd rather be than right here. And there is no one I'd rather be with. I promise you, I'm not going anywhere."


	15. My Hero

William Hanna and Joseph Barbera were geniuses among mere mortals, Cas decided as he split his attention between watching the woman beside him sleep and watching the freakishly tall gray cat chase the small, freakishly lucky brown mouse around the T.V. screen at his feet.

He really liked television. It truly spoke to the unique creativity of humans. Anything they could dream they could make possible on the small screen. He also liked it because of the choices. One of his favorite activities was to flip between channels, exercising his free choice in a most satisfying way.

He was still learning how to deal with the options that life presented him. Thousands of years of having someone else there to make decisions was a hard thing to get past. In a lot of ways, he was like a recently released prisoner, set free into a world full of endless possibilities. He wished, as he often did when he tried to remember how things used to be, he had a chance to thank Anna, the Angel that first introduced such notions into his head. But he never got the chance.

In fact, he betrayed her to the other Angels, turned her in, because whether he liked her or not (and he did), whether he thought she was right or not (and she was) those were his orders. And back then, that was all that mattered.

He stopped that line of thinking in its tracks, knowing that it was the perfect in for the Leviathan that ran loose in his head. His guilt was their weapon. They knew it. But now he knew it, too. And if he could just keep those thoughts at bay until it was safe to work through them, he could hold them off.

He nuzzled his nose into the mass of tangled black hair that rested on his shoulder and breathed in her scent as deeply as he could. It was his weapon and it was a powerful one. The more he got to know the demon in his arms, really know her, the stronger that weapon became. Every look she gave him, every detail that made her 'her' that he learned, every touch that left him aching for more, solidified his resolve to stay with her.

She was his anchor, saving him over and over in a hundred little ways a thousand times a day. And he didn't think she even knew it.

Oh, she knew full well that what he felt for her was more than lust. She wasn't stupid. She was far too shrewd not to see his feelings written all over his face. He was pretty certain she felt the same way. She just wasn't ready to admit that. But that was okay, he could be patient. As long as he had times like these to hold on to, he could be eternally patient.

She made a tiny noise and tilted her chin up as she sought him out.

"Why aren't you sleeping?" she asked, groggily. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. Everything is fine. I think maybe I'm just too glad to be awake to want to sleep yet," he answered after an honest assessment of his feelings.

She glanced towards the T.V. then back at him with a smile. "So you're watching Tom and Jerry? Dean will be so proud."

"Scooby Doo just went off. I found it fascinating," he informed her, with a smile of his own.

"Again, Dean will be so proud," she said with a roll and a stretch, followed closely by a yawn that Cas found completely captivating.

"What about you?" he asked, fishing for one of those little details he loved so much, but were so hard to cultivate from her. "Do you like cartoons?"

"Cartoons are alright. Although I like mine a little more grown up, you know, South Park or Family Guy," she answered, lazily.

"No, I don't know, but I will watch for them."

She turned towards him in a sudden spin that almost made him dizzy for a moment. "What's with all the questions?"

"What do you mean?" he replied, knowing full well what she was talking about.

She rolled her eyes. "'What do you mean', he asks so innocently." she mocked, good naturedly. "Yesterday, all day, it was questions. What do you like to eat? What kind of music do you like? What kind of movies? This morning it's cartoons."

"If it bothers you, I'll stop." he conceded, not bothering to argue.

"No, its okay. But this doesn't work like that, not really. You know that, right?"

"What doesn't?"

She crossed her arms on his chest and rested her chin there. "Getting to know someone, really know them, takes time, Cas. I know you're on some kind of crash course mission on everything Meg, but those are all just pointless details. They don't mean that much."

"But those details are the important things. Those little, pointless, day-to-day details are what makes you, you," he argued.

"No, they don't. The fact that I'm impatient, intolerant, moody and impulsive are the things that make me, me. All the other stuff is based off those things."

He couldn't help the chuckled that escaped his lips. "Did you happen to notice that all the things you just mentioned are your less desirable traits?"

She rolled her eyes. "Those were just the things off the top of my head. I'm sure there are some good things in here, rolling around somewhere."

"They aren't so deeply hidden as you'd like us all to believe. You're kind and nurturing, and strong and resilient. Just to name a few things off the top of my head." He pointed out with a smirk.

"You know, I really should be telling you to stop saying things like that," she warned.

"But you aren't," he reminded her.

"There is no way this is going to end well," she insisted.

He leaned up, dislodging her from his chest and took her in his arms. "Who says this has to end?" he asked before he kissed her.

She indulged him for a moment before she pulled away. Then, dragging the sheet up around her, she crossed her arms over her chest to hold it there and sighed. "I knew we'd have to do this sooner or later." She gave him a crooked smile that was more sad than anything else and ran a hand through her hair. "Why couldn't you have just let it be later?"

"Do what? I'm not sure what we have to do." He told her, sitting up a little straighter.

"Have this talk about what this is and where it's going and what it all means," she answered with a tired sigh.

He eyed her carefully and didn't like what he saw written all over her face. She was ending this now. He could tell. He might not be that experienced in these situations but her body language was hard to miss.

She reached a hand out and placed it gently on his shoulder as if to soften the blow she was about to deliver. It was again a move from the tender side of her she'd claim didn't exist. "Cas, I need you to understand that this thing we have, this is all it's ever going to be. There isn't going to be a happily ever after for us. It's just not possible."

"Is that all you want it to be?" he asked, not ready to let her just give up before they even tried.

She paused and that gave him hope. "It's all it ever can be. One day very soon, you will be back to being you and I'll be back to being me."

"So?" he pressed. "Even before we suddenly became human there was something between us. You know it as well as I do."

She nodded slowly. "Yes, there was lust and curiosity and the proverbial forbidden fruit."

He huffed and shifted. She took her hand from his shoulder and crossed it back over her chest. "There was more than that, at least from my end and the fact that you stayed with me, took care of me when I couldn't take care of myself, says that you felt it, too."

She pulled the sheet with her as she got to her feet, then wrapped it around her like a modified toga. He suddenly felt very naked and pulled the scratchy cheap, peach colored blanket into his lap to hid his bareness.

"I stayed because I felt like it was my best option," she argued.

He rolled his eyes and sighed. "You keep saying that but we both know it isn't true. You were doing just fine on your own before you found out I was still alive."

Again, she pulled her hand through her hair. "No, I wasn't. I was on the edge, so tired from running and hiding I was ready to just give myself up to Crowley. You have no idea what it was like for me and the others he decided he had a beef with. Believe me there are plenty of them still out there and if I hadn't found an in with the Winchesters by taking care of you, I'd still be with them, living on the edge of the world, watching every step to make sure I wasn't leaving any trace behind, terrified that every move I made would be my undoing."

He watched her while she spoke then looked away when he saw the pain in her face. He hated seeing her in pain. He wished more than anything he could take it all away. "You're wrong. I do know what it's like to constantly look over my shoulder. I understand what it means to run and hide for your life. I've been there, too. Don't you think the Angels would have loved to get there hands on me when I was causing them so much trouble."

"And you had an army of followers watching your back the entire time. I had me. For so long, I've been the only one I could trust, the only one I could truly depend on. I'm not even sure how to trust anyone else anymore. Don't you get that? I'm not the one for you." She suddenly stopped her pacing and came to sit beside him on the bed. Her hand came out and rested on his leg. "Cas, I'm so broken there is no fixing me. You deserve more than that. You deserve someone whole and complete. I'm not that person."

He reached out and took her hand before she had a chance to move away again. "I don't want anyone else."

"How do you know?" she spat out abruptly. "You've never had a chance to look anywhere else. You're here because I'm the first girl that made your nethers flutter. Don't you want a chance to see what else is out there before you determine I'm the one."

"That's not true," he rebutted. "I've met other women before. You aren't the only female I've ever known. You are just the only one that's made me feel like this. That has to count for something."

"Sam and Dean will be here soon. We should probably shower and get dressed," she hedged as she glanced at the clock beside the bed.

He refused to let her go when she tried to pull away and instead pulled her closer. Close enough that her lips were merely inches from his and she had to choice but to look him in the eye. "I don't know how yet, but I'm going to find a way to prove to you I'm the one you can trust, the one you belong with. I'm going to make you see that this thing between us is right." He told her, before kissing her with everything inside him. "In the meantime," he said when he finally pulled away. "whatever this is between us now, it isn't over yet, not by a long shot."

Then he let her go, flipped the blanket back and padded, barefoot into the bathroom, hoping she'd follow him.

* * *

She hadn't wanted to follow him. She hadn't intended to, but, in all fairness, the confidence in his voice when he told her he wasn't about to let her end things was her undoing. It always was. He didn't show it often. Most times she'd classify him as meek and mild, but the minute that flash of power reared its head, she was a goner. Every single time. And the worst part was, she was pretty sure, he was catching on to her little secret.

Twice now when she'd determined to stop this crazy train in its tracks, he'd waylaid her with that commanding presence and authoritative aura. She hated herself for that little weakness. It was a character flaw and if he ever really figured out how powerful a tool it was, it was a dangerous one.

This was an insane mistake of the most perilous kind. But as she took the sponge and ran it along the plains of his muscled back, she just couldn't find it in herself to care. As her fingers brushed through the bubbles of soap that clung to the very light scattering of hair across his pecks, she knew that despite the fact that this would most likely be the death of her, she knew he was right. This wasn't over yet. Like he said, not by a long shot.

The biggest problem was, he was right about another thing as well. She absolutely was in love with him, had been for a very long time. She'd just never imagined there might ever be a scenario where he might actually feel the same way. But here they were. At least he thought he was. And maybe that was where the real problem came. He thought he was, but he'd be the first to admit that this was the first time he'd ever felt this way. She just couldn't trust him to know how he really felt. What happened when, five years down the line, he found out that what he felt for her wasn't anything near what he was actual capable of feeling for another person. How could he be so sure about how he felt?

His voice startled her when he stepped into her and whispered gruffly in her ear, "What are you thinking about so hard?"

"You, me, us," she answered back as she tilted her head up to meet his eyes.

"Stop. We've done enough thinking for now. Just stop and let this be what it is." He told her in that commanding, forceful voice that always got her.

"What about Sam and Dean? Are you prepared to let them in on this?" She wanted to know, not sure how she'd handled it if he said yes.

"No, I think this is best kept between us for now. They will just think you're taking advantage of me," he answered and she heaved a sigh of relief. "Besides, this doesn't concern them. At least until I'm fully well again, the less they know, the better."

"Then we should probably get out of the shower together. It might tip them off that something is going on if we both answer the door in towels," she said with a smile.

"Okay, but only because I don't want to have to hit Dean in the face if he makes any more comments about you that I don't like."

She wrapped her arms around his slippery shoulders and leaned up on her tip-toes to kiss him. "My hero," she sighed against his lips.

"I will be if you'll just let me," he said.

She chuckled and remembered his words from the night before. "How do you always seem to know just what to say and when to say it?"


	16. Dr Phil-ed

"That's not bad work," Dean muttered as he carefully inspected the glyph on the wall between the over-sized window and the door to the motel room.

"Well, thank you for your approval since I was the one that taught you how to do that in the first place," Cas muttered right back at him, sullenly.

The two had barely said two words to each other since the brothers' arrival and air of near hostility coming from Dean was almost palatable.

"So explain to me again how it is that you're sudden all perfectly sane," he demanded spinning back towards the room in general and taking a seat at one of the chairs by the table.

Cas sat perched on the corner of the bed with his hands knotted together between his knees and Meg sitting close, but not too close, by his side. Sam had taken up residence in the room's only other chair and was watching the exchange silently with a look that said he was prepared to jump in if he needed to.

"It's simple really. Like I've already said many, many times as long as I don't dwell on my mistakes, on the past, I can stay here in the present and remain functioning."

Dean gave him his famous sarcastic smirk and readjusted in his chair. "You mean as long as you pretend like none of this is your fault, you're just fine and dandy."

Meg tensed visibly and Cas very, very nearly reached a hand out to place it on her leg to still her. But he stopped himself at the last second and just gave her a look instead.

"I am very aware that all of this is my fault. But until I get to this Dream-walker person, I just can't think about it. I assure you, once I can deal with all this guilt and still be able to function, I will. I know exactly what my role is in all this," Cas answered him in his best calm, collected voice.

"And what if she can't help you like you think she can? What if all this is for nothing and in the end you find out you just have to deal with your shit just like everyone else does?"

Again, Meg tensed and again, he sent her a calming look. "You think that is what this is all about? You think I'm just looking for some easy way out of taking responsibility for my actions?"

Again, Dean shifted. "Well, the thought had crossed my mind. I mean we've all had our crosses to bare, things we've done that we can't take back, yet here you are with a nice, neat little way to make all your crap go away."

"Dean," Sam started but a harsh look from his brother shut him up before he could get any further.

Cas got to his feet slowly. "I am doing what I think is best so I can make amends for all this by stopping it. Isn't that what you want? Or would it be more satisfying for you if I suffered more in the process? Would that fulfill your sense of fairness?"

Dean got to his feet as well and the two of them stood a mere foot apart, staring each other down. Cas could sense Meg shifting behind him but she hadn't gotten up yet. Sam was on the edge of his seat now, but he hadn't actually moved yet either. Both of them were sitting in wait, trying to determine if they needed to jump in and cool the situation off.

Dean's next words ended the debate for them. He took his eyes from Cas for a moment to glance over at Meg and Cas knew what was about to come. He was ready for it, in fact. His hands were already clenched in fists at his side. "And what part of your therapy entails you fucking a demon?"

In a swift move that was even more impressive considering his now human state, Cas stepped forward and delivered a blow to Dean's jaw that sent him staggering back into the chair behind him.

Meg and Sam were both on their feet now, each poised at their champion's side and ready to take up their cause if needed. The room was dead silent as they all watched and waited for Dean to make the next move.

Instead of getting to his feet again, he sat up, chuckled and rubbed at his jaw. "I remember back when you first showed up," he said whimsically. "Do you remember that, Sammy? Do you remember him threatening to take you out if you didn't stop your thing with Ruby? My, my how the mighty have fallen."

"This is different. That was different. It isn't the same situation at all," Cas defended himself.

"How's that? How is it so different?" Dean asked, sitting up a little straighter and letting his jaw go.

"He isn't drinking my blood, for one thing," Meg interjected. "That brings a whole new level of gross to the situation."

Cas took a step forward when Dean's eyes went to her instead of him. "And I'm in love with her."

While Sam and Dean stared at them both in stunned silence, he felt Meg's hand on his shoulder and heard her quietly hiss, "Cas!"

He took his attention away from the threat in front of him for long enough to cast a look to her. "What? We can pretend it isn't true all we want. We can not talk about it all we want. But none of that makes it less real."

"I need some air," Dean announced as he finally got back to his feet and before anyone could stop him he was gone.

"I'll go talk to him," Sam offered, getting up as well.

"No," Cas stopped him. "I'm the one that needs to talk to him. I'll handle it. You two just wait here. It's better if we do this alone anyway."

Before he could take a step, Meg grabbed his hand and held him there. "You're sure about that? You'll be okay?"

He turned to her and gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. "I'll be fine. I need to try to make him understand."

"Well maybe when you're done, you can come back and do the same for me. Didn't we just talk about all this?"

Cas sighed. "I know it's not something you want to deal with, but it's the reality of the situation. It isn't going to go away, whether you approve or not." He leaned forward and kissed her gently, only pulling back when Sam cleared his throat uncomfortably.

Meg let his hand go and as he made to step out the door he heard her call, "Don't hit him again."

She watched the door close behind him with more than a little apprehension. If he got out there and Dean started bringing up the past and throwing it in his face, she wasn't sure he was strong enough to resist the things in his head that constantly tried to pull him back under. Dean might think he was good ole' Cas again, but she knew better. His hold on the present was tentative, at best. If Dean sent him spiraling into the black hole of his mind again, she would kill him.

"So," Sam said, a touch too loudly as he went back to his chair. "How about them Yankees?"

Meg took her eyes from the door reluctantly, knowing there was nothing she could do to help Cas now. He was right. It was a conversation he needed to have alone. Still, she wished he would have waited until after their visit to the Shaman.

"I'm a hockey fan. The violence turns me on," she answered settling herself back down on the bed where she'd started out.

He gave her a half smile before his face turned suddenly serious and she could feel a heart to heart coming on that she wasn't really prepared to deal with. She was still reeling from Cas' sudden admission of love. Oh, she'd known it was coming, but hearing it out loud was an entirely different thing.

"It sounds like things between you and Cas have gotten pretty intense," he commented casually, as if he was talking about the weather.

"It sounds like it, doesn't it?" she smirked.

"I take it from your reaction that's the first time he's said that," he surmised, wisely. Meg declined to answer and instead crossed her legs and folded her arms over her chest while refusing to look at him.

"I'll take that as a yes," he answered himself, drily. "Do you feel the same way?"

She rolled her eyes and huffed. "I don't want to be 'Dr. Phil-ed' by you, Sam."

"I'm just trying to help. It looked like there might be some kind of issue going on between you. I figured you might want to talk about it, maybe with someone outside the situation. Someone who isn't judging either of you," he offered, sliding forward in his chair and giving her that voice he used on witnesses to get them to open up when they were too terrified to talk to anyone else. He really had a knack for it. In fact, she thought musingly, he might have really missed his calling by doing the law school thing. He would have made a great psychologist or maybe even a victim's advocate.

She cut her eyes towards him and narrowed them as she took him in. "What's in this for you?"

He quickly shook his head. "Nothing, except a chance to see a friend of mine be happy. If you are what he's decided makes him happy, then I want him to have that."

She sighed, and hated herself for giving into him, but he really was very persuasive. "It doesn't matter to you that I'm a demon and he's an angel and this will never work out in the long run. Soon we'll go back to that and we'll end up enemies all over again."

"That's not how I see it. Right now, all there is is a guy and girl and they obviously both have very strong feelings for each other," he explained patiently. "And you know as well as I do, that even when you were both what you truly are, you were never, really enemies. Besides you have no idea how permanent this thing that Chuck did to you is. Maybe you'll never be more than you are right now again."

She shifted uncomfortably and uncrossed her arms, letting them fall to her lap. "Do you really think that matters? We are complete opposites. This just can't work and I can't make him see that."

"Once Cas determines something is the right course, you can't change his mind. You ought to know that. And for whatever reason, he obviously has decided you are his right course."

She got to her feet now, feeling the need to move, and began to pace. "But the only reason he's decided I'm the right course is because he hasn't bothered to look for any other options."

Sam chuckled. "You think he believes he loves you because he hasn't tried out anyone else? Is that what you think?"

"The thought had crossed my mind," she muttered as she continued her path from the nightstand by the bed to the bathroom door and back again.

"You never answered my question. Do you feel the same way?"

"Maybe," she spat. "I don't know."

"Yes, you do," he countered.

"It wasn't supposed to be like this," she spat impatiently. "We were supposed to have a little fun. A nice, uncomplicated fling. That's it. Then he had to go and bring all this touchy-feely crap into it."

"Because it's Cas and you had to know going in that he isn't the type to do uncomplicated flings."

She sighed again and flopped herself back down onto the bed. "Yeah, I guess I did. I just figured with him knowing what I was, this would never be an issue."

"Then you don't know him very well. Or you were lying to yourself. I was there in Crowley's underground bunker, remember? There was something between you even then and you really were enemies at the time."

"Okay, so I've been in love with him for years. Are you happy now?" she finally admitted with a bitter edge to her voice.

"No, I'm not happy now," he answered, pointedly. "I might be if you didn't make it sound like it was the worst possible thing in the world that could have happened."

"Well, isn't it? This is Cas we're talking about. And I'm still me and I still say there is no way in the world he isn't going to get hurt in the end."

"Why are you so convinced that he will?" Sam asked, with a furrow between his brow like he really didn't understand what she was saying.

"I don't do feelings. I don't even remember how to deal with all this. It's been a really, really long time."

"So you don't think you're worthy of him? Is that what you're getting at?"

"In a nutshell," she confirmed. "I'll hurt him and he doesn't deserve to be hurt anymore."

"Isn't that his choice to make? Besides, isn't it possible that as much as he needs you right now, maybe you need him, too? If you're truly serious about all this turning over a new leaf and being a better person, maybe Cas is exactly what you need. Someone to be worthy of."

"Alright, Sam. You've made your point. I get it. But don't you think that right now we have bigger things to deal with?"

It was Sam's turn to sigh. Then he sat back in the chair and rested his ankle on his opposite knee. "I think there will always be bigger things to deal with. And I also know what Cas is dealing with as far as the things in his head are concerned. I know better than anyone. You think he's managing it all on his own. But he's not. It's you that's making that possible, you and his feelings for you. That's what he's holding on to. If I had something like that to cling to, I might not have gone as crazy as I did."

"So you're saying he needs to feel like he's in love with me right now so he can stay sane?" she asked, sitting up and trying to keep the hurt from her face. Whether she admitted it or not, she didn't want to believe that Cas' feelings for her weren't real.

"No, I'm saying he IS in love with you and because of that, he has an anchor."

She glanced at the door, suddenly concerned with how long Cas and Dean had been gone. "You know your brother is out there right now trying to talk him out of thinking he's in love with me."

"I know. But I also know Cas and I know whatever Dean is saying to him won't make a bit of difference in the way he feels about you."

She didn't say it out loud, but she really hoped he was right.


	17. Face to Face

Cas stepped out into the cool air and realized for the first time in days how cold it was getting. Honestly, he wasn't even sure what month it was, but judging by the temperature, winter was quickly approaching.

He glanced around, looking for Dean, first in his car, which was parked right in front of the room, beside Meg's blue compact. He wondered for the briefest of moments how she'd happened upon the car. Then he dismissed the thought, deciding he probably didn't really want to know.

He found that happened a lot of the time where she was concerned, but he could live with it. He was already learning. It was simply a case of not asking questions he didn't really want to know the answers to. He trusted her. If there was something he needed to know, he didn't doubt that she would eventually get around to telling him about it.

Someday, he hoped, it wouldn't take her as long to get around to as it did at times. Someday, he'd figure out how to win her trust and prove to her that he wasn't going anywhere. He knew very well that most of her issues were about exactly that. She'd been abandoned so many times, left alone to fend for herself in the most unfriendly environment possible. Add to that the fact that she'd been disillusioned over and over again, barely recovering before another of her unshakable truths was blown apart in her face.

That he really could understand. It was hard to believe in anything when everything you've ever believed was proven wrong. That was why he was determined now to make his own truths, things he knew without a doubt, were absolutely unshakable truths.

His first was his love for her. He knew it. He believed in what he felt. And that was something. He wasn't believing in much of anything else at the moment. He'd even lost his belief in his friendship with Dean.

That had been a hard blow. He truly felt there was nothing the two of them couldn't get past. Now he knew better. He'd been proven wrong again. It was the last of his old beliefs he'd held to. Now it was gone just like the rest of them.

A light blinking across the street grabbed his attention when he continued his search after not finding Dean anywhere close by. It was a timely light. He used it's distraction to shake off the thoughts dancing through his head. He didn't fully understand yet why it was so much easier to keep his demons at bay when Meg was around. But it always was and he hadn't braced himself for being away from her.

They'd almost gotten in. A few more seconds on that line of thought and he'd be pulled down into the blackness so far he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to pull himself out of it.

Almost all of his guilt was aimed solely and directly at Dean.

He'd let him down. He'd let down the one person that always believed in him, always had his back, even if he wasn't at all positive Cas was right. Dean was that person, the one who was on his side. Always. No matter what. Or apparently, almost no matter what.

He blinked and physically shook his head. Damn, the things in his head were working overtime. He'd known meeting up face to face with Dean wouldn't be easy. He still had no idea how the hell Dean knew about his relationship with Meg.

They'd thought they hid it so well. Neither of them had shown any sign. The room was cleaned up. He just didn't know how Dean had surmised the scope of things between them. The one thing he had decided on his own was not to lie to him about it. Meg probably wouldn't be happy with the choice he'd made, but he couldn't add another regret to his list with Dean, it was already at it's breaking point.

The light that caught his attention blinked again and this time he concentrated on it hard enough to see that it was a neon red sign in the shape of a beer bottle in the window of the establishment across the street.

With a deep breath, Cas moved towards it, knowing now exactly where he'd find Dean.

To say the place was a dive was putting it mildly. The aroma of smoke and alcohol mixed with a smidge of desperation and a touch of despair hit him along with the droning noise of some wronged cowboy whining about somebody doing somebody wrong and wanting to hear a song about it, the moment he opened the door.

Dean wasn't hard to spot given the most obvious piece of furniture in the room was a long, wooden bar with a gold rail running along its bottom. It took up the entire right side of the smallish space and left little room for the random tables and booths scattered throughout the rest of the place. The jukebox, an old-timey contraption with actual LP's spinning in its window, sat right inside the door.

The wall behind the bar was mirrored so Cas knew very well that Dean saw him come in. He was pretending not to notice him, but he knew better than that. He knew Dean better than that. There wasn't much he wasn't aware of at any given moment. He was perched on a red upholstered stool, hunched over the middle of the massive bar with a tumbler of some amber colored liquor in his hand. As Cas stepped towards him, trying not to cringe at the sound of what he hoped was sawdust under his feet, Dean took his glass and flung back its contents in one giant swig. Then he set the glass down and signaled the bartender for a refill.

He was just receiving it when Cas took the stool next to him.

"Save it," Dean said before Cas had a chance to say anything at all. "There is nothing you can say that will make all this alright."

"I'm not trying to make all this alright," Cas began and Dean turned to him far enough to make his eye roll more dramatic. "Alright, maybe I am trying to make all this alright. But what choice do I have. The two of you are the most important people in the world to me. I have to try to make you understand."

Dean took another shot from his glass. "Can't be done."

"You haven't let me try yet," Cas argued. "Don't I at least get that much?"

Dean leaned back and turned to him to give him his full face. "Cas, we've been through a lot, you and me. More than I've been through with anyone else and that includes Sam. But there comes a point when you have to look at the person you call friend and realize they aren't who you think they are. I think we've come to that point."

"That's ridiculous, Dean. I'm still the same as I've always been," Cas protested.

Dean raised his glass at him. "See, that's what I'm afraid of. I'm afraid that this really is who you are and the person I think of when I think of you is someone I made up. Because the person in my head-" he paused and threw back the drink, set it down and looked back at him with leveled glare. "and you are not the same person."

"Setting the obvious aside, what have I done to make you think I'm not that person anymore?" Cas asked, even though he knew the answer already.

Dean signaled the bartender again and this time when he came over, he ordered Cas a drink as well.

Then he waited silently until he came back with it before he turned on his stool so he was facing Cas again. "She's a demon, Man. She is what we hunt down and send back to Hell. She is what we fight, not what we -"

Cas knew where the sentence was heading and stopped him with a hand on his chest. "I get the picture," he assured him, still not entirely comfortable with the vulgarity he encountered from Dean and sometimes, Meg as well. It took some getting used to. "Maybe you didn't hear the part where I said I love her."

"No, I heard you loud and clear. And maybe you even think it's true. But then maybe you only think it's true because she's the first female you've really ever been in contact with and now you're suddenly human and there must be all these feelings and whatever running around in there with their butterfly fluttering and their rosy dreams of happily ever after."

He was rambling fairly animatedly and Cas was having trouble keeping up with what he was talking about. The fact that the two drinks Cas had already witness weren't the only ones Dean had consumed was obvious. He thought about stopping him, but every time he tried to get a word in edge-wise, Dean started off again.

Cas decided to sit back on his stool, look like he was intently listening, sip his whiskey and let Dean get it all out.

Besides, Cas thought to himself, while trying to hide a grin, he was saying all the same things that Meg had said to him the night before. He almost told Dean that, but decided at the last minute that it might not be well received.

When Dean slumped on his stool with yet another drink in his hand and seemed to run out of steam, Cas jumped in.

"I know she's a demon, Dean. Or she was before. But can you honestly tell me one thing she's done that actually hurt anyone?"

Dean looked up slowly and there was fire in his eyes when he threw back his drink, "Jo and Ellen," he said quietly through gritted teeth.

"That was different," Cas said after a regretful pause. "She was acting under orders then. Just like me when I sent Anna away. You forgave me, can't you think about forgiving her?"

Dean narrowed his eyes. "You want me to just forgive her for killing two of the best people I've ever known? Just forget it like it never happened."

"No, I want you to put the blame for their deaths where it belongs, with Lucifer. Blame the commander, not the solider," Cas answered insistently. "Besides, even you have to admit, she's been on our side more often than not lately. She's trying to make amends."

Dean huffed. "That's what she's got you believing?"

Cas took a deep breath, biting back the anger the comment inspired. "No, it's what I know."

Dean started to take another gulp from his glass, but he stopped halfway there and sat it back down. "It's just that there are so many other women out there. I know you aren't the love 'em and leave 'em type like me, but we can find you a nice girl and you can settled down with her and be normal if that's what you want. It's not my bag, but I understand."

Cas chuckled. "That is what I want someday, to settle down and be normal. But it's what I want with Meg. I don't need to keep looking. I know it."

"You think that's what she wants? To stay human and get a house and have a passel full of children?"

"We haven't talked about all that, but I'm willing to bet it's exactly what she wants, too. I know her, Dean. I know her a lot better than you do. I think the problem with the pictures in your mind, isn't with mine. It's with hers. She isn't who you think she is. She isn't what you think she is."

"Really? And who has she told you she really is?" Dean asked, sarcastically.

Cas sipped his whiskey and thought about that for a moment. "It isn't who she tells me she is. In fact, if you ask her, she'd tell you she is exactly who you think she is. It's more who she shows me she is. She's a lot like you." Cas hesitated when Dean narrowed his eyes at him again. "I mean, you two have a lot in common. You might find she could be your friend. If you give her a chance."

Dean slammed his glass down on the bar a touch forcefully. "I will never forgive her for Jo and Ellen," he announced with more than a little slur in his voice.

Cas got to his teeth sadly and put his hand on Dean's shoulder for a minute to help steady him on the stool when he began to wobble. Then he pulled away and frowned at him. "If you won't ever forgive her for Jo and Ellen, how are you ever going to forgive me for Bobby?" he asked, quietly.

Then he turned and walked out of the bar before Dean could give him an answer. It was probably one he didn't want to hear.

When he came back to the motel room, he had to knock since he'd forgotten to grab a key in his rush to go after Dean. It was Sam that answered and Cas was a bit disappointed. He'd been expecting to see her and even the moment or two delay in that was more than he wanted.

Sam stepped aside and held the door looking after him for his brother.

Cas found Meg with his eyes, did a quick scan of her to make sure she was alright, then turned back to Sam. "Dean is at the bar across the street. I'm afraid he's a little too drunk to move right now."

He went to the bed and sat down beside Meg, close enough that when he stretched his hand out on the mattress he could touch her fingers. He did just that, as inconspicuously as possible, knowing that would be how she wanted it.

"Did you two talk?" Sam asked, still looking out the door. He finally shut it and went back to the chair, but only to gather his things, like his jacket and phone laying on the table beside the chair.

"Yes, but nothing has changed. I think it's best if we just keep our distance until after I take care of this Shaman thing and get everything back to normal."

Sam chuckled, pausing with his hand on the doorknob. "I don't think I even remember what normal looks like, Man. Good Luck with the Shaman. Call us if you need anything and," he paused and turned his eyes to Meg. "think about everything I said."

Her nod was almost imperceptive and he nodded back before slipping out the door.

"Sam!" she called before he made it out completely. "Don't be an idiot and let him drive."

Sam laughed. "Seriously? This is the only time I get to drive the car. I wouldn't give that up for anything. Besides, he'll pass out as soon as I get him in and then I have radio control until he comes to again."

He shut the door after giving them both a wave.

"So," Meg started, then let the rest of the sentence just die away.

Cas turned to her. "I'll make a deal with you, I'll tell you what Dean had to say, if you'll tell me what Sam said to you."

She thought about that for a moment, longer than he expected her to, before giving him a smile. "How about we get our crap together and we get on the road? We are on a mission, after all."

"That's what I thought you'd say," he mumbled, humorously as he got up and started to pack.


	18. Magic Wo-man

_*Cold late night so long ago, _

_when I was not so strong, you know;_

_A pretty man came to me_

_Never seen eyes so blue;_

_You know I could not run away. _

_It seemed we'd seen each other in a dream;_

_Seemed like he knew me, _

_He looked right through me, Yeah. _

_Come on home, girl_

_He said with a smile_

_You don't have love me_

_And let's get high a while_

_But try to understand, _

_try to understand, _

_try, try, try to understand, I'm a Magic Man._

Cas reached up and turned the radio down before he found out whether the girl went with her Magic Man or not. Meg, who had been singing along with the song, gave him a look of impatience, but said nothing about the abrupt silence.

"Are you sure everything is alright? Did something Sam said upset you?" he asked, as he turned towards her as best he could with his seat belt keeping him in place.

"No, everything is fine. Why?" she answered without taking her eyes from the road.

"You haven't said much since we left Watertown. I was worried maybe Sam had said something," he answered.

She chuckled. "Sam said plenty. But nothing that upset me. I'm fine." Then she added with a smile. "Just jamming to the radio before I was so rudely interrupted."

"I didn't mean to interrupt. I'll turn it back on," he offered. But she reached a hand out to stop him.

"It's okay. The quiet is nice, too. Besides, we're almost there."

"Really?" he asked in surprise. "We've only been driving for a few hours. If we were this close why didn't we just drive through instead of stopping."

Meg gave him a quick glance. "I don't know. I was tired. You looked tired. I figured we needed a break."

"Really?" he asked, again, this time with raised eyebrows because he could sense there was more to it.

Meg looked out the driver's side window for a moment before turning back to him. When she did, he found she was biting her bottom lip.

It was her tell. Now he knew she wasn't telling the whole truth. He waited instead of prompting her again, hoping that she would give him the answers on her own. He wanted to see if he was making any progress in gaining her trust.

"Okay," she said finally. "God, you and your steely eyes. I just don't know what we're going to find up here and I thought it would be nice to get to spend just a little more time with you before all hell broke loose. In case it does, you know."

"Thank you," he said, sincerely and with a smile. "I'm glad we stopped. It was nice getting to spend more time with you, too. But I don't care what kind of hell breaks loose. I'm not going anywhere." He turned his gaze back out the front window and before he added, "I thought maybe what I said upset you."

She didn't seem surprised that he was bringing the subject up. It was if she were waiting on it, in fact when she quickly replied, "It surprised me, that's for sure. Especially since we talked about not saying anything at all in front of Dean and Sam."

So she was deflecting again, trying to shift the focus of the conversation on the Dean part of it instead of her own response to his abrupt declaration. He decided he talked to and about Dean as much as he wanted for the day so he turned back to her. "I know what Dean's reaction to it was. I want to know what yours is?"

"What do you want me to say?" she asked, after a hefty sigh. "I already told you this wasn't a good idea."

"That's not what I asked," he answered, coolly.

"Can we just table this for the moment and come up with a game plan here? Should we get a room, or go straight off to find these Abenaki Indians?" she said.

"It early still I guess we could find the Indians," he replied. "It shouldn't be too hard to locate a tribe of Indians located near town."

Meg pulled into the first diner they came to after hitting the city limits and they made there way inside. She could have sworn she felt him reach for her hand as they passed through the door but she dodged it quickly. She definitely wasn't ready for PDA. They found a quiet, out of the way red table-topped booth in the back corner and started towards it. Meg's boots made squeaking noises on the red and white checkered tiles around her feet causing her to feel like the whole place had eyes on her. When she slid into the booth across from Cas, she realized how noisy the crowded little place was and it made her feel silly for being so self-conscious. Dishes clanked, silverware tapped, glasses rattled and layer, upon layer of voices nearly completely overrode the strains of some Fifties do-whop song humming in the background.

The kitchen was open and she spent a moment watching the fry cook flip an omelet out of a pan with expert ease. She'd been in places like this before and the fry cook always amused her, but this one was particularly good at his job.

The waitress that made her way tiredly towards them was a little chunky, dark-haired and looked like she'd worked about twelve hours too many. She arrived with two menus and after handing them out she introduced herself as Renee and took their drink orders.

When she came back with the two cups of hot coffee, Cas looked up at her and Meg nearly burst out laughing as she watched him. His eyes were dazzling and his smile was crooked when he said, "So Renee, we're here in town working on a historical paper about your town. We wondering if you could tell us about any of the local interests, particularly about the Abenaki Indians."

Renee dropped her pad and pen to her sides with weary, but friendly smile. "The Sokoki have a tribal headquarters here in town. Plus the local library is full of things on the Indians and everything. Now what can I get you today?" she said holding her pen and pad up again.

Cas' face fell, but he covered it well. Meg could tell he'd been hoping for more. But it was obvious Renee just wasn't the chatty type. Which was fine because Meg wasn't the tipping type.

"We'll go to the tribal headquarters after we eat," she told him and almost reached out to grab his hand from across the table. She wasn't sure why she'd nearly done it and it scared her a little to think about how easy the movement would have been to complete.  
They were firmly and convincingly told at the tribal headquarters that no one there knew anything about any Journey Woman named Abornazine. Actually, they all looked at them like they were crazy, eye-balling them intently until they made their way out of there and over to the library.

"Listen to this, it says its believed that some of the Abenaki people are still hiding in the woods around the inlet to Lake Champlain," Cas read aloud. "Maybe that's where she is, hiding in the woods."

Meg lowered the book she was reading just enough to see him over it. "You want to go traipsing about in the woods looking for her?"

"Seems pretty logical to me. If she's as legendary as she supposed to be, they would want to hide her away from the rest of the world. The woods would be the perfect spot."

"You know I just remembered something. Didn't Chuck say something about Demons hiding her?" Meg asked, setting the book aside altogether. It hadn't been much help anyway.

"Why would Crowley be protecting this woman? Surely it isn't because he knows she can help me."

Meg shook her head. "I doubt he has enough forces to get that kind of intel that fast. We just found about it a few days ago. Chuck talked like they were already in place."

"Like they'd been in place for a while," Cas agreed.

They sat silently for a while, neither saying anything as they try to piece together the clues.

"There was a rumor going around for a while about this band of wanderers, demons like me, not under Crowley's thumb. They said they'd found something valuable up north. I thought they meant they'd found themselves a Windego or a Dijinn that they were playing with. But what if they meant her?"

"Then we might have a bigger problem than how to find her," Cas answered.

"Yeah, like how the hell we're going to get to her," Meg agreed.

* * *

***- "Magic Man" is a rock song released in 1976 by the band Heart. Written by Ann and Nancy Wilson.**


End file.
